


100,000 Miles And Feeling Very Still

by deadonarrival



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Space Exploration, Anal Sex, Apple Pie, BMW 507, Consensual, Consensual Somnophilia, Did I say peril yet?, Dirty Talk, Drinking, Drowning Mention, Drunken Flirting sort of, Drunken Kissing, Drunken behavior, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Except Sarah Rogers I'm Sorry, Frank talk of death or potential death, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Past Peggy Carter/Angie Martinelli, Implied Past Steve Rogers/Peggy Carter - Freeform, Implied past cheating, M/M, Making Out, Minor Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Minor Riley/Sam Wilson, Mixed Signals, Near Death Experiences, Panic Attacks, Pay Attention To The Author Notes, Referenced or Implied life or death situations, Sex, Space Disaster History, Space Flight, Space Peril, Space history, Steve Rogers Cooks, Stressful Situations, Swearing, Talk of Steve's Past Ailments (canon compliant to a point), This might include asthma and joint pain mentions, Vomit Mention, Vomiting, drinking and talking, forgot to put that one in earlier, it's not really but it's close and I don't want anyone to come screaming about it, no one dies, ooh peril!, people not talking about their feelings, tags may change!, unprotected sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-11-03 15:37:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17880485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deadonarrival/pseuds/deadonarrival
Summary: Steve Rogers took a job at NASA and his life is pretty okay. Maybe not great but he has some good friends and things seem to be mostly stable. Except one day their new astronaut recruit walks in and everything in Steve's life goes upside down.It's a story about falling in love in bits and pieces; with a person, with a place, with a career, with space.Like any Shakespearean play there's comedy, and misunderstandings and tragedy but there's a point to all of it and I promise there's a happy ending.





	1. Viking - 1975

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my first attempt at a Big Bang fic in ... maybe ever? Also you should all say a great big thank you to [a_bit_not_good_yeah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/A_bit_not_good_yeah/pseuds/A_bit_not_good_yeah) who I dragged out of fic writing retirement to Beta Read this fic for all of you. She did a ton of heavy lifting to make it into the incredible bit of work it is today. 
> 
> Also you should all follow along with my incredible artist at [Winter Sergeant](https://winter-sergeant.tumblr.com/) \-- she made THREE PIECES of absolutely incredible art for this fic to correspond with upcoming chapters and I'm just chuffed that she's my companion on this journey. 
> 
> I hope you all enjoy reading this as much as I liked writing this.

Steven Grant Rogers. This is your life. 

****

It was the tail end of summer and everything was dripping in heat. Literally dripping. The humidity was so high you could swim in it. Steve had his bags packed and ready for medical school because he was a good boy and his mother, who had raised him all by herself as a nurse, always said he had a surgeon's hands. He had always preferred art but far be it for him to let down Sarah Rogers. Getting top marks in undergrad, he was now headed to an illustrious continuing education on scholarship. No one could be more proud. 

Steve had kissed his mother goodbye, thrown the last of his stuff in the back of his hand-me-down pickup truck and followed a beautiful, smart woman who wanted to be a neurosurgeon to Emory. 

They were in love. 

At least until she slept with the head of surgery, Dr. Angie Martinelli, and declared Steve too immature, headstrong, and impulsive. 

Well, alright.

Six months after he'd moved into the big city he was dropping out, moving home and going to join the service. He spent four years in the Army and discharged just in time to move back home and watch his mother waste away and die. It hadn't been the best. He spent a year there afterwards, taking care of the estate and making ends meet before he realized that he had to face reality again. So he phoned up some old contacts, re-applied at his undergraduate alma mater because where else was he supposed to go?  
He had enough science credits to put him just about anywhere, and top marks, which is why when he went and spoke to his adviser he got roped into the best alternative.

"Steve, you're a good man," Erskine had leaned over the desk patting his hand and smiling, "but you deserve more. Get a career-track degree and get out of here." 

"Maybe I like it here," Steve said. 

"You want to live here, with all these ghosts?" Erskine asked. 

And he was right. Steve was here because he was haunted by the place, not because he actually wanted to stay. It just felt like his only option. 

So he didn't register that day. Instead he took home the paperwork and threw it onto his pokey coffee table and tried not to run a track into the carpet while thinking over his options.

Steve hadn't actually participated in the necessary undergraduate program but was still eligible for the Masters based on his science grades and his service time. He’d need a nomination from someone who could verify his aptitude for the psychological strain it might take but he was lost for who might qualify. 

Still, it was a career-track. He'd have a job at the end. Guaranteed. 

After his third shot of tequila he cracked his knuckles, grabbed a pen and filled out the forms before he lost the nerve. The next morning he was back, turning it all in to Erskine. 

“All I need is the nomination,” Steve said, tapping the final qualification on the last page. 

Erskine quirked an eyebrow at him and smiled, sliding open his desk drawer and reaching in to withdraw an envelope with Steve’s name on it. 

Steve looked down at swirling script and back up at Erskine, “you already wrote it?”

“I had a lot of faith in you.” 

Steve looked at the collection of materials in front of him and thought about the upcoming work. The Aerospace Engineering track was relatively new at the University of Georgia. It had been introduced sometime after NASA had felt the global pressure to perform and move forward with not just technology but the people in charge of that technology. The agency looked old from the outside and the young, politically active American public was having a tough time relating. 

In 2006 NASA Ames and the International Space University had put on some kind of space summit opening ceremony in conjunction with Singularity University, some Silicon Valley think tank and funding body, which had been a stepping stone for NASA to start opening branches of what was essentially a boot camp for incoming recruits fed by some of the nation's top Universities. 

UGA got on board after their ongoing rivalry with Ga. Tech had made it a near necessity to remain competitive in the sciences so they opened up undergraduate spots that were a combination of psuedo-ROTC and hard sciences. It was a demanding undergraduate program that acculturated students to what was expected of them at NASA before feeding them directly into the graduate-level study course that Ames had designed.

 

Steve was worried he wouldn’t be able to cut it, that he had used up all his excellence the first go round and this was just a shot in the dark. 

But he wanted to make Erskine proud. 

 

****

Two years, three short term relationships and a handful of one night stands later he was graduating a second time. Older, wiser, but most importantly with a signed contract to get shipped down to the epicenter of launch activity – Cape Canaveral. As it turned out, Erskine had been right all along.  
There was something about Athens that made a person settle. Maybe it was game days or just the fall leaves, but whatever it was, it could either turn you into the marrying type or it could give you cabin fever like nobody's business. It was just time to go. Time to pack it in and leave the place behind. It hurt to sell his mom's house, to have to donate the things that were hers that he had no intention of taking with him. This was a new life, the very epitome of starting over from scratch. 

He was maybe a little terrified because he'd never felt so alone in his life, but he hoped that it would fade. The long drive on I-95 made his arms hurt from having to hold the steering wheel of the U-Haul steady so that by the time he was pulling up into the apartment complex he was so sore he just wanted to drop. 

But this was it. This was home. 

The stucco walls, the Mediterranean tiled roof, the brick-red door... he had signed all the paperwork over the internet so it was kind of sight unseen but he had faith it wouldn't be all bad. The office had said the keys would be in a lock box on the door and he had the code so... Steve opened it up and stepped through for the first time. Thankfully it was on the first floor and he didn't have to deal with the stairs... but it was nice - it was spacious, plain, and he worried immediately if he had enough furniture to fill it. 

"Okay," he said, into the empty space, voice echoing. "Home." 

He spent a lot of time unloading the truck, carrying the boxes into his apartment, stacking them up in the empty dining room against the wall that doesn’t have any windows in it. It’s military precise, a game of complicated tetris. First one row, then another on top until he’s maybe five high and he starts a second row deep. Furniture, what little there is, is rolled in on a dolly. 

Steve keeps at it until it’s done and dark, returns the truck and then stands there in the apartment, still mostly empty. He supposed the next step would be unpacking but as he stood there, all he could think about was how easy it was to inflate an air mattress for another night and deal with it the next day.

The place began to smell a lot like his old house in Georgia and it made him miss his mom. Without really thinking, Steve dragged a folding chair out to the screened-in patio and popped it open in one of the corners that provided the best view. He sat there, drew his knees up to his chest and stared at the little pond. 

The wind rustled a nearby tree, and he could hear the sound of distant cars on the busier road, the frogs croaking and he thought what the fuck have I gotten myself into.. 

So when he drove through the checkpoint and showed off his newly minted badge the next morning, a sense of calm came over him. He could do this. He could do this and he could love it. He had to.

They were a good group, his coworkers, the camaraderie was strong and he knew within minutes that he just fit here. The crew at the Cape welcomed him with open arms and promptly set him up in an office and took him out for drinks. They'd ended up at a local dive, taking turns ordering rounds. Steve found he was in the company of devoted locals, read: borderline alcoholics and ended up as their DD that night. 

He was their new favorite. 

They called him Captain. 

****

But that was a long time ago and Steve feels like maybe he was a different man back then. 

He's still the DD these days, he's still the Captain, but now he feels a little less shine on the whole thing. When he first came down to the Cape, it had all been high gloss and brand new; candy-coated and sugar sweet. He was the new hire and made to feel important, respected, and empowered. 

Now? 

Well, he’s at the local dive bar meeting up with the regulars because they have a newbie joining the team and want to 'induct him properly.' Steve knows that’s typically code for 'haze him until he can't walk straight' so he gets there early and stakes out a corner table to make sure they all have a home base and that no one is going to die. He even has a pitcher of water delivered and is sipping a cherry coke. He’s responsible, and everything is going great. 

He can hear a group outside the doors to the bar and he knows that’s his people. The tangible energy they bring with them is already hitting and he can’t help but grin just a little. 

When the door opens, Tony has his arm around some guy's shoulder and the two of them are laughing, sharing some private joke. Steve waves to get their attention and Tony shouts across the bar. 

"Captain! Look what we dragged up for you!" His voice is animated, sing songy as he shoves at the stranger with him, pushing him forward. 

And alright, he’s attractive, tall, built like a pilot, and dressed like a trashy tourist. 

He makes a sloppy salute and winks at Steve, sliding into the booth. "Hope I pass muster, James Buchanan Barnes," he holds out his hand to shake and Steve takes it, nodding politely and shaking back. 

"Steven Grant Rogers, nice to meet you." 

Before they can get another word in, the rest of their party is piling into the booth, flagging down a waiter and ordering those disgusting beer towers that Steve can only look at in horror as he prays that none of them get knocked over before they’re emptied. Not that he needs to worry - this table is filled with people who are eager to drain them and by the time shots start the entire group is a shitshow. 

Steve sighs and gets a refill on his cherry coke, the bar filling in with other people and growing all the more crowded and that much more out of control. He’s fine - as long as everyone gets home safely from his group, he’s alright and he’s going to make sure that happens. But it’s a long time until last call and frankly he isn’t sure where everyone is. They’ve abandoned the table and are now ordering directly from the bar, dancing, screaming along to whatever’s playing on the sound system... 

Oh. Oh no. 

A loud cheer goes up and Steve grimaces. 

“Oh you've got to be kidding me-” Steve mutters. 

“I can't believe they're really going to give him a contract.” 

Steve turns to Coulson and raises an eyebrow, “A contract?” 

“He's been hand picked for the Astronaut Corps.” 

Steve shoves his hands down into his pockets and narrows his eyes up at the man, no, boy on the bar who’s singing along to one of the trashiest hair metal songs in history. 

It’s hard to tell what’s worse, the fact that he’s actually decent at it or that the rest of the people around the bar are singing with him and cheering him on. 

“Who'd he have to blow to get the contract?” 

Coulson squints, “that's the sad part. He didn't blow anyone.” 

Steve turns, very slowly, to face his coworker so they aren’t screaming over the sound of the music and the patrons next to them. 

“Excuse me?” 

Coulson sighs and sets his empty bottle down on the table before turning fully towards Steve and laying the whole story out. 

Supposedly James was some kind of astro-physics prodigy from the University of Florida, but Steve was fairly certain James had really majored in douchebag with a minor in alcoholism. Apparently none of that factored into his appointment to the elite flight team at NASA. Either that or they were overlooking it because of his stellar grades and general popularity. Coulson muttered something about the agency needing an image boost and taking this as an opportunity to go the Hollywood route: put a pretty face on it and anyone will buy it. Unfortunately they had to find a pretty face with a brain, and James Barnes was just lucky enough to have both of those and be in the right place at the right time. 

“Just tell me I won't have to work with him.” 

Coulson gives him a smile that looks more like a threat and shakes his head looking skyward as he starts to push himself off from the table and walk away, “oh you'll work with him alright.” 

“Hey!” 

Coulson waves him off and keeps trying to navigate the crowd. 

“Damnit Phil!” 

He watches as the old manager sticks his fingers in his ears pretending not to hear him and Steve turns back to the spectacle in front of him trying not to clench his fists so tight he pops his knuckles. Again. 

So now he knows James is supposedly some kind of prodigy from UF with a very illustrious if short Naval career but... he was starting to question NASA's decision making. No one with any level of intelligence would be caught dead dancing on a bar in Cocoa Beach to 'Pour Some Sugar On Me'. And yet, here was James Buchanan Barnes, completely shit-faced, doing just that. 

It was one of the few things that Steve would remember later. Very few. 

***

Steve wakes up on the beach without his shirt and with sand in places he isn't sure are legal. 

James is curled up against him, head pillowed on his arm, snoring and -- ah, there's his shirt, James is using it to cover his face and keep out the sunlight. 

"What in the fuck," Steve hisses and James makes a groaning sound, rolling closer and Steve just scoffs, not sure what the etiquette here is or if there's some kind of protocol -- he knows there has to be a form to fill out about this kind of behavior at work and -- 

"Shhh, s'fine it's Saturday," James grumbles, sliding a hand over Steve's chest and pushing himself up so he can look down and give Steve a bleary smile. "Think you can give me a ride back home?" 

"I --" it all comes slamming back into him. 

Last call at the bar. Putting everyone into cabs. James forgetting his address. Steve trying to give him water. James begging to just go to bed. Steve saying they should walk it off. James RUNNING IT OFF ONTO THE BEACH. Steve chasing him. Steve catching him-- oh. 

He remembers the way James had laughed when he'd caught him around the waist and they'd collapsed down into the sand, how he gave up instantly but then how he sprawled onto his back and gasped. 

"What?" 

"There's so many stars," James had blinked slowly - the alcohol probably making him see double, but Steve let it go, laid there beside him and stared up. There wasn't as much light pollution as usual and there were no clouds so they had an amazing view. The milky way stretched out above them like a wisp of smoke and Steve could easily pick out the constellations - tracing them with the tip of his finger as James laid next to him, taking it all in. 

"I'm gonna go there," James said, when Steve had pointed out Mars. 

"Yeah?" Steve asked. 

"Yeah." James raised his arm, bumped his hand into Steve's and pointed to Mars himself. 

Steve had turned to the side, expected to find arrogance on his face but instead James had just been filled with a sense of wonder and for a moment, Steve forgot that he was a drunk jackass and he actually really liked him. He tried to get him to go but James had said, 'let’s just lay here a minute. I love the beach at night.' 

And because Steven Grant Rogers is an idiot, he had said yes. 

Steve had used his shirt as a blanket for both of them when it got chilly and he guesses it had migrated over James's face when the sun started to come up. 

"You're a disaster," Steve says. 

"All the best looking boys say that," James says, sitting up and squinting out at the water. "I'm going for a swim." 

Steve sits there, shocked, until James is standing and shucking off his clothes, "this is a pUBLIC BEACH--" 

"Yeah but it's like 5 am," James shrugs and winks over his shoulder, "enjoy the view?"

Steve turns red on cue and averts his eyes but as soon as James is walking away he looks up and watches him sink into the water, one step at a time. He reminds Steve of a Greek myth, of the supernatural, of stories you tell children about why they shouldn't trust strangers and how things that disappear into the sea are cursed. 

He wonders if James is cursed, or if he's cursed because he wants him. 

And realizing that is a real punch in the face. 

"Fuck," Steve says, to no one in particular. 

**** 

He could call James an Uber but also, he’s pretty sure that no one in NASA wants there to be a whiff of their new toy being ferried around hungover or still drunk by a rando in Cocoa Beach at whatever time of the morning this is so Steve makes the executive decision to take James back to the hotel himself. It’s the responsible thing to do and has nothing to do with the way his stomach feels funny whenever James turns that bone-melting half smile at him. That would be stupid. 

They’ve put him up at the Residence Inn off Astronaut Blvd, presumably because then it’s a little less like staying in a hotel room what with the mini-kitchenette. Not that it does much of anything but it’s the principle. He pulls up to the side entrance that requires a key card to enter since that feels a bit less ostentatious than dropping James off at the front desk in his condition and he feels like he’s done his due diligence. 

"See you later James,” he says, attempting to be casual as he fiddles with the radio and hits the unlock button on the doors.

"Bucky." 

"Excuse me?" Steve glances up sharply. 

"Call me Bucky." 

There’s that butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-my-mouth smile that Steve has been trying to avoid. He stares and watches the way that Ja--Bucky bites his lip and he doesn’t understand what’s going on but he goes with it and nods, sending Bucky off with a smile that he knows is tainted with a blush. He’s always been bad at hiding his emotions and this doesn’t seem to be an exception. He’s hoping Bucky doesn’t see since he’s already halfway out of the car and Steve heads home in a haze of oxytocin and tries not to let it all get to him. He can’t concentrate though, keeps flipping the station even when it’s a song he likes and by the time he’s parking his car he’s started fidgeting with his nails. 

He should probably shower, but the nervous energy has him now and he waters his cactuses instead, grabs a book and sits there bouncing his leg up and down with the vague idea that he’s going to settle himself down before he adds a slippery surface into the mix. He’s a grown man. He can handle himself. 

What actually ends up happening is that he falls asleep under a book he’s been reading about string theory that he frankly does not understand for shit but that he wants to at least pretend to ‘get’. He’s interested in the concept at its heart but when they start getting into the really heavy math of it, that’s when they lose him. The more artistic representation of the loops of string, the melodic way they describe the reactions, that’s what Steve likes, and how he best understands it, but then someone scribbles out a formula and he’s back at college again and pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. 

When he comes to a couple hours later, the sun is glowing heavy over the tops of the apartment buildings and the heat of the day is starting to ease into an almost gentle effervescence that he secretly loves. Maybe some people complain about how hot it gets in Florida, in the South in general, but Steve kind of likes it. He finds his joints don’t ache as much, that the heavy, lethargic quality of late afternoon is like a too-hot bath. You just have to give yourself over to it, that gasp, the breathlessness of the heat hitting you all at once and then it wraps into you everywhere and it’s soothing, calm. And there, in that haze of cicadas, a text is waiting for him from an unknown number. He starts to delete it on autopilot but then he reads the preview text and stops, opening it in a rush. 

**[Unknown Number]**  
_Sorry to be creepy this is Bucky I got your number from Phil - want to grab dinner, I owe you one._

Steve stares at it for a minute and then adds Bucky to his contact list, a smile tugging up the corner of his mouth. 

**[Steve]**  
_Sure, where do you want to go?_

**[Bucky]**  
_I’ll come pick you up in half an hour-ish._

**[Steve]**  
_Sounds like you’re just trying to get my address_

**[Bucky]**  
_You found me out._

Steve grins and sends Bucky his address and goes to hop in the shower, deciding to brave the experience so that he’s not still rank from sleeping on the beach like a hobo. 

He’s just pulling on a clean shirt when there’s a tentative knock at the door and when he opens it, he finds Bucky on the other side, holding up to-go bags of chinese food and a six pack of beer. 

“Figured we had enough of being out in public for one twenty-four hour stretch.” 

“My hero,” Steve says sarcastically, letting Bucky in and taking the beer from him to go stash it in the fridge. Bucky laughs and starts unpacking boxes on the dining room table. 

“Saving you from social interaction, one meal at a time.” 

“Bless.” 

****

Steve throws on Netflix because he’s not home enough to commit to cable and it’s nice not having to constantly record shows he wants to keep up with… also he’s guilty of bingeing on things he likes but he swears up and down that he doesn’t do that. 

Bucky hasn’t seen the Great British Bake Off and Steve is happy to back track and start at the beginning to haze him into the cult of Mary Berry. As far as casual hangouts with friends go, it’s easy to sit back with Bucky and get lost in just chilling on the sofa together, picking at the various Chinese take out containers and getting incredibly invested in the various dessert bakes. Not that the savory ones aren’t good but Steve’s got a sweet tooth and he’s always been a sucker for a cake. 

At some point the console pauses and asks if they’re still watching and Bucky laughs, “that’s always so fucking judgemental, ‘are you still on your ass watching that show? haven’t gotten up to make anything useful of your life?’” 

Steve snorts, “I try not to take it too hard, but it gets me every time.” 

“Awwww,” Bucky grins and fluffs at Steve’s hair with the arm that’s slung along the back of the couch casual-as-can-be. Steve isn’t sure when it got there but he misses it as it slithers down and falls into Bucky’s lap. “I guess that’s as good a cue as any that I should probably drag my ass back to the hotel.” 

“You don’t have to, we can put another episode on,” Steve says politely even though he’s obviously flagging. His eyes were drooping through the last episode and he’s stifled more than one yawn. One of which is making its way out now. 

Bucky just smiles and opens the Uber app, flicking his eyes up to see Steve putting away some of the empties and stretching. “My ride should be here in about 4 minutes,” Bucky says, carrying some of the closed up containers of leftovers into the kitchen behind Steve. 

“Sorry I can’t drive you,” Steve says, smiling a little ruefully behind his yawn. 

“Don’t worry about it, maybe if I end up sticking around here long term I’ll bring my car down or something so I don’t have to rely on rides,” Bucky says pointedly. 

Steve grins tiredly and Bucky’s app pings at them from his pocket. 

“That’ll be me then.” 

Steve walks him to the door and holds it open for him, waiting for Bucky to pull his shoes on. He’s rocking back on his heels just outside, hands in his back pockets and giving Steve this shy look that Steve can’t quite parse. He blames it on being tired and a little tipsy and half in a food coma. Bucky bites his lips and looks up through his lashes. 

“Thanks for saving my ass on the beach and for hosting dinner,” he says. 

“Any time,” Steve says and then fumbles out, “on either of those.” 

Bucky laughs and Steve angles a little more towards him and Bucky seems to be watching his lips. Maybe it’s all in his head or just the late hour talking or maybe Bucky is just really friendly but … but fuck. Fuck it. It’s a stupid time to be brave and reckless but Steve kind of wants to be, something about being in Bucky’s orbit, the way he doesn’t quite care overly much, the way he blends seamlessly into the rest of the air conditioned evening like he’s meant to be there and always has been. Steve feels breathless with want that hasn’t hit him since he was way younger and dumber. God it’s a bad idea probably, but he can’t stop himself. 

Steve leans in and brushes his lips against the corner of Bucky’s mouth and it’s right at the moment that Bucky’s phone starts ringing. 

“Uh!” Bucky jerks back in shock and looks down at his phone grimacing. “Fuck that’s the Uber driver -- sorry I -- I have to go, thanks again Steve.” 

Bucky waves and then jogs off towards the parking lot and Steve slinks back into his apartment, closes the door and lets his head thud against its surface. 

What the fuck was that? What did he just do?!


	2. Pathfinder & Sojourner - 1997

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updated the tags... 
> 
> Welcome back and here we are for round two of awkward adult men being awkward adults. Now with added best friends trying to mitigate their stupidity with middling success. 
> 
> For those of you who are baffled at any abbreviations please standby as I'll be going through and adding a little glossary. My beta pointed out that not everyone knew all the screwball abbv that NASA uses.

“Heading back to JPL tonight!” Tony says, throwing himself into Steve’s office at the end of the day on Wednesday. He manages a dramatic flourish and Steve looks up from where he’s working on an email reply and frowns. 

“I thought you were staying through Friday?” 

“Well, duty calls etc etc, besides, Friday was the optimistic plan but Wednesday was the realistic, budget-justified plan.” 

“Ahhhh,” Steve nods. The thing is, Tony doesn’t work at NASA because he needs the money - in fact he could probably fund NASA on dividends from his own pocket. He works at NASA because he loves it and because it gives him something to do, a place to work and invent. So it’s kind of comical when he vents about bureaucracy and financial planning because his job is the only place he actually has to adhere to that kind of thing. 

“Anyways,” Tony glances around then toes Steve’s door shut, and comes over to sit on the edge of his desk, “just wanted to see if you wanted to chat before I headed back - anything I can’t answer before I go? Things you might not want to share over the secure line?” 

Steve feels a little sweat break out on his brow but shrugs, “nothing I can think of really.” 

Tony nods and clasps his hands together over his knee, “because a little bird told me that you had Barnes over to your apartment for dinner over the weekend and you maybe tried to put the moves on him.” 

“OH my God,” Steve blanches and shoves back from his desk, “is this a --- is this an HR thing? I mean, it’s definitely an HR thing, do we need to call Sharon?” His hands are shaking and he glances around trying to think about how fast he can pack up his desk. 

Tony just snorts out a laugh, “it’s not an HR thing, boy scout - it’s an ‘I didn’t know you were into guys thing.’” 

Steve makes a pained face and Tony waves at him in ‘well!?’. 

“Listen it’s -- I don’t really -- hnnngh!” 

Tony slides off the desk and pulls one of the chairs opposite Steve up so he can face him, “I know you haven’t dated anyone since you started working here because you’re basically working 80 hours a week and in the gym the rest of the time to work out all the job stress, but did it never occur to you to tell any of us?” 

“I didn’t know how to bring it up really? I figured as long as I wasn’t dating anyone it wasn’t really … it’s just not a normal topic of conversation is it?” 

Tony scoffs, “what’s normal?” 

Steve mumbles through some half-started thoughts and Tony waves him off, “the point is, no one cares that you kissed Barnes, I mean - that I know of. I don’t care that you kissed Barnes, I don’t care that you kiss any boys at all really. I’m a little offended you never thought to kiss me--” 

“--Tony!” 

“--seriously though, look at me, why wasn’t I first choice?!” 

Steve puts his face in his hands and turns red because he never wanted to have this conversation with anyone but having it with Tony under THESE circumstances feels really ridiculous and it’s making his hands shake. 

“I’ve had -- I’ve had relationships with plenty of men and women in my life and I just -- it’s… I’ve been really busy here and enjoying that for a long time so it didn’t occur to me to really bring it up with anyone? I--” 

Tony laughs and kicks his feet up on Steve’s desk, “I’m just trying to get under your skin here - Barnes was texting me about it last night--” 

“Oh GOD--” 

“Chill out, Rogers, he was saying you guys were hanging out over the weekend and you got a little drunk and kissed him, thought you might be too embarrassed to talk to him afterwards since you were straight.”

Steve leaned back in his desk chair, covering his face and groaning because how had this turned into such a nightmare so fast?! 

“I thought I was getting a vibe off him over dinner and I just, when he left there was a really quick kiss and then he rushed out and I was pretty sure that was a no, more like a hell no from him so I haven’t -- well I was fairly certain he didn’t want to talk to me after that,” Steve says in a rush, “I mean, I don’t regret -- well I guess there’s a little regret? I didn’t mean to scare him off it just… it seemed like a good idea and he was kind of -- no nevermind. It was a bad call on my part and I--” 

“He thought you only kissed him BECAUSE you were drunk,” Tony says, cutting Steve’s line of thought in half. 

“I’m sorry what?” Steve straightens in his seat and levels a confused look at Tony. 

“He thinks you were just doing it because you were tipsy and not because you’re actually into guys and I said I didn’t know because I’d never actually seen you with a guy so … I said I’d ask.” 

Steve makes a noise somewhere in the register of strangled and Tony sighs, shaking his head, “you know this all could be avoided if you just spent some time actually having a personal life.” 

“I have a personal life! I go out with people around here all the time -- I’m the DD!” 

There’s a knock on the door and both Tony and Steve look up as Clint carefully pokes his head in, signing: ‘drinks tonight?’

“See - that right there,” Steve says, motioning to Clint. Clint just looks confused and Tony rolls his eyes. 

“Steve will go out drinking with you, I have a plane to catch. Which, believe me, pains me to say.” Tony signs it in addition to speaking it since he’s turned half away from Rogers. 

“Awwww,” Clint taps his hearing aid and looks honestly disappointed and Tony levers himself out of the chair. 

“I know, boo, I feel the same way,” Tony casts a look back at Steve, “straighten this mess out with Barnes okay?” 

“What’s the mess with Barnes?” Clint asks. 

“Nunya,” Tony says, slinging an arm around his shoulders and guiding him out of Steve’s office. 

“Nunya?” Clint asks, voice fading into the background.

“Nunya business!” 

Steve hears them cackling down the hall and he stares down at his phone trying to figure out if there’s an appropriate text to send that’s something along the lines of ‘HI I AM DEFINITELY INTERESTED IN GUYS WHILE SOBER’ that doesn’t come off as creepy as hell or too late or just… weird. There isn’t actually and he thinks maybe the best way to handle this is just to wait until drinks later. There’s a high probability that Bucky is going to be there with them so he should just take advantage of that and make amends in person. 

****

When he gets to the bar that night Clint and Natasha are already there along with a number of other KSC people that Steve knows and works with. They’ve taken over one of the larger corner seating areas and he grabs a beer, opening a tab as he heads that direction. 

“There you are!” Natasha shuffles over so that Steve can slide into the booth and Clint waggles his fingers at him. 

“Thought you guys would need your regular,” Steve says with a grin. 

“Nah, not planning to get drunk,” Natasha says, slinging an arm up along the back of the booth, “just unwinding… pushing that new launch schedule and all, they want it rolling out in under a year which is six months off our original date.” 

Clint sighs, “which is doable right? It’s just a lot of long hours and trying to make sure we’re all above board and meeting requirements.” 

“Mm,” Steve murmurs into his pint glass. “Just as long as safety is priority.” 

“Always is,” Natasha says, tipping her head back and momentarily closing her eyes, “anyways - you going up to the game this year?” 

Steve sighs, “I don’t know… I want to but also I don’t know if I want to do the whole tailgating thing and isn’t that the whole point?” 

“How can you not want to tailgate?!” Clint sputters. 

“Well, after last year,” Steve says, eyebrows drawing together. Natasha laughs and Clint at least turns a little red. Last year they had gotten a group together and done a convoy up to Jacksonville for the FL/GA game with the intent that they’d tailgate like mad and then watch the game in a dive bar somewhere. But that was before Clint had gotten into a drink-off with some frat boys in an adjacent tent and Steve had to break up what was quickly escalating into either a fist fight or maybe an orgy? He’s honestly not sure and really he doesn’t want to know either. 

“I can rein it in--” 

“It’s not just you, I think a year off might be kind of nice - watch from home or something, not have to worry about hotels and parking and traffic. That whole,” Steve motions vaguely with his beer bottle and Clint nods along. 

“Well if you change your mind..” he says, letting the offer hang off in mid-air. 

They’re interrupted when Phil and Wanda come in along with a few others and the volume intensifies at their table. Steve hops up to give his seat to someone, trading his beer for a coke and while he’s at the bar relaying his order and checking his tab, the door swings open and a cheer goes up from his table. 

Framed in the doorway is Bucky, smiling and waving at everyone else, and then faltering slightly when he sees Steve. 

Steve turns away immediately, accepting his drink from the bartender and focusing somewhere in the middle distance where there’s a television playing a game of something. Soccer? Maybe? 

“Hey.” 

Steve jumps and Bucky snorts a little laugh. 

“Sorry you--” Steve turns and grabs some cocktail napkins to mop his spill up, shaking his head and giving Bucky a pained look. 

“Startled you?” 

“Yeah a -- yeah a little, I wasn’t paying attention…” 

Bucky shrugs nonchalantly and orders a cocktail when the bartender swings by him, taking the soaking napkins from Steve and politely not commenting on the fact that Steve is a disaster. 

“You kind of startled me the other night so I thought… turnabout is fair play and all…” Bucky says, smirking and turning so that he and Steve are just standing, companionably side by side and pointedly not looking at each other but Steve can tell Bucky is watching out of his periphery and Steve is burning up bright red. 

“I… I’m -- look it -- I just-- I’m really sorry I wasn’t drunk and I --- uh -- I just thought I was getting a vibe from you,” Steve stutters, glancing down at his coke and then stabbing the straw through the ice a few times trying to get ahold of himself. “It’s …” 

“So you aren’t drunkenly into dudes, you’re just …. into dudes,” Bucky clarifies, smile dancing over his lips. Steve is pretty certain he is at this point going to catch on fire. 

“I -- yeah -- I was mistaken about you I shouldn’t have assumed. FUCK I’m really sorry,” he hisses out. Steve frantically stirs his drink and then gives up turning to Bucky looking helpless, “I really - I was unprofessional and I’m not usually like this and I don’t want this to ruin our working relationship and--” 

“It’s fine,” Bucky says, taking his drink from the bartender, swinging it over and tapping it gently against Steve’s glass like a ‘cheers’. 

“It’s not fine!” Steve insists. 

Bucky leans in and presses his mouth close to Steve’s ear, so close that Steve can feel how hot his breath is, “trust me, it’s _fine_.” 

Steve stands so still he’s beginning to wonder if he’s going to take root here, but then Bucky is pulling back, and the look he gives Steve is something else entirely and Steve wonders if maybe he’s hallucinating. 

“Is --” Steve starts and then cuts himself off. 

Bucky licks his lips and winks, turning and making his way to the table, leaving Steve standing at the bar, bewildered and flailing like a fish out of water. 

****

They don’t actually talk that much while they’re at the bar, probably a side effect of there being so many people and all of them dropping in and out of various conversations with each other, but still, Bucky finds Steve at the end of the night as if they’re the last two men on earth. Steve has Clint and Natasha in the back of his car and he’s already put several other people in cabs and Ubers so he turns to Bucky, offering the same courtesy. After all, even if they aren’t -- whatever -- he can still be courteous. He still needs to be polite. His mother would kill him if he had bad manners. 

“You need a ride?” Steve asks. 

Bucky laughs and motions at the obvious rental car on the far side of the parking lot and shakes his head, “nah, I’m actually driving myself.” 

Steve frowns, “are you--” 

“I only had two drinks,” Bucky assures him, reaching up and smoothing the collar of Steve’s shirt down absently. Steve isn’t sure what to do with the feeling that flutters in his stomach but he tries to squash it down until Bucky leans in further and brushes his lips against Steve’s cheek. “Hey Rogers?” 

Steve, starstruck and dizzy stares at him as if held by a tether, “yeah?” 

“Ask me out.” 

Bucky bites his bottom lip and ducks his head, like he’s suddenly shy and then he shrugs, shuffling backwards and motioning to his car as Steve stares after him in shock. 

“ANSWER HIM YOU IDIOT!” That’s Natasha, leaning out the back window and Steve jolts. Bucky does too, as if he forgot they had an audience, and there, in the electric glow of the bar sign, in a cracked parking lot, Steve shouts. 

“Dinner at my place on Friday?” 

“Yeah, alright!” Bucky shouts back. 

Steve tries to ignore the whooping of Clint and Natasha from the back of his car, but even if he could, he can’t ignore the way his insides seem to be doing the same goddamn thing. Only louder. 

****

The complexity of the recipe he chooses is in its simplicity. It’s a pot roast in a crock pot which means he puts it on first thing in the morning before work and sets it on low and when he comes in to his apartment that night, the whole place smells warm and inviting and delicious and he’s had to do very little work to get there. Steve hopes it’s impressive enough for Bucky. It’s his personal favorite but also it’s not nearly as fancy as some of the things he had been eyeballing in his cookbook. Still, there was something to be said for just having a good, home-cooked meal. It was the type of person he actually was after all - no use selling Bucky on something fancy out of the gate only to get his hopes up and then reveal that actually all Steve is good for is being ridiculous and sentimental. 

At the last minute he thinks of a dessert and finds some slightly freezer burnt pie crusts in the back of the freezer that must be from last Thanksgiving but the good news is they’ll do. He also has some apples and other accoutrements and in about 15 minutes he’s loading an apple pie into the oven as there’s a knock on his door. 

Steve has an expectation of what will be there when he opens it, he thinks of Bucky in a date outfit, of him looking somewhere between shy and smug and Steve can’t help but think that he’s won the lottery. In the few short steps between the kitchen and his destination, his palms begin to sweat and as the door knob slips under his fingers he laughs a little nervously at his own bullshit. But whatever he was expecting isn’t there on the other side. Instead what’s there is Bucky in a pair of well-loved jeans, a tee shirt that seems just one size too small and he’s holding a bottle of wine up as he pushes his aviators into his hair. 

“This okay?” The shy/smug smile is definitely a thing though and Steve presses his lips together tight, trying not to smile too hard. 

“Yeah, yeah that’s fine.” He ducks his head and lets Bucky in, follows him for a moment until Bucky seems suspended between decisions and Steve presses a hand to the small of his back and guides him towards the kitchen. 

“What smells so fuckin’ good?” Bucky asks, looking around and Steve shrugs, motions to the crock pot, waves noncommittally to the oven. 

“Just some stuff I threw together, you hungry?” 

“A little,” Bucky says, handing the wine to Steve to open and hopping up on the counter to wait. 

Maybe it won’t be a thing, whatever this is shaping up to be, but the way that Bucky looks as he swings his legs, heels tapping the cabinets, is really something else. Steve’s chest feels tight and insecure but he pours two glasses of wine, and then shambles up until he’s standing in front of Bucky. 

“Your drink,” Steve says, and Bucky slides his legs open until Steve is sliding in between them, their hips pressing together. 

“Thank you,” Bucky says, his grin incandescent. Steve takes a long swig of his wine, looking Bucky in the eyes and trying to mete out his courage because he wants to do this right. He catches Bucky’s smile pressed into the curved edge of the wine glass, and Steve can’t help the blush, can’t stop the heat that floods into his cheeks and then Bucky is laughing at him again. 

“I’m trying to be cool here,” Steve hisses, ducking his head, shoulders shaking. 

“Oh Rogers,” Bucky says, setting his glass aside and then reaching for Steve’s adding it to the counter as well, “I don’t think you could ever be cool.” 

“Excuse me?” Steve glances up through his bangs and Bucky snorts, sliding his hands over Steve’s shoulders and then down his chest, shaking his head. 

“No, you dress like a school teacher - a hot one - but still--” 

“Hey!” 

Bucky throws his head back, hands wrapping around Steve’s waist as he pulls him forward, legs wrapping around his hips. 

“I never said I wasn’t into it!” 

Steve rolls his eyes and Bucky noses at the underside of his chin, “do you have a timer on the oven?” he asks, still chuckling a little. 

“Yeah,” Steve says, looking back over his shoulder just to check and make sure. 

“Good, now c’mere.” 

Bucky’s hand wraps around the side of his neck and threads into his hair and then their lips are brushing. It’s soft and casual and Steve can feel Bucky’s smile and for the briefest moment he isn’t sure where to put his own hands so he just grabs the counter and holds on, letting Bucky kiss him, lead the kiss himself - take it as fast or as slow as he wants to. Steve just wants him, any way he can have him and he’s resigned to just blind acceptance at this point. Not that it’s bad, God it’s really not - it’s incredibly good and he’s drowning just a minute in. 

As it turns out, Bucky wants to take things slow, building up with these easy, chaste presses that get longer and more intense; until there’s the slide of his tongue tracing Steve’s bottom lip and Steve tips his head to the side and groans. He’s saying ‘yes’ but he’s pretty sure he just makes an indeterminate noise. Bucky doesn’t seem to mind though… he keeps going, pressing into Steve’s mouth, wrapping both hands around his shoulders and Steve might feel brave, might feel delirious actually but his hands move from the counter to Bucky’s thighs and that-- that sets something off. 

Bucky moans back at him, twisting, arching into Steve as Steve’s big hands trace the supple curve of his legs up to his hips and back to his knees. Not hitching him closer, not moving him at all - just keeping him where he is almost as reassurance. A simple message, ‘keep going, don’t stop,’ and Bucky doesn’t. 

They’re still making out like that when the timer on the oven beeps at them and Bucky makes a despondent sound and yanks Steve in until they’re so tight together that Steve can’t ignore the arousal between them both. “Fuck,” Bucky says, voice hoarse. 

Steve licks his lips and knows he must look dazed. He pecks Bucky at the corner of his wet, puffy lips and then pulls back reluctantly, turning the oven off and carefully setting the pie out on the top of the stove. When he turns back around, Bucky is sliding off the counter, trying to sort himself out and Steve snaps a little, stepping forward and pushing him back against the cabinets, one arm wrapped around his waist and the other tangling fast in his hair so he can force their mouths together in a needy, hot, kiss. 

The noise that comes out of Bucky is something like a squawk mixed with a moan but when he realises what’s happening, he gets with the program fast, letting Steve dip him into it, holding on to his biceps and Steve opens him up, fast and thorough until they both pull away panting. 

“Dinner’s ready?” Steve says, voice shaky. 

Bucky huffs out a breathless laugh, closing his eyes and then tucking his head into Steve’s shoulder. “God, Fuck _you_.” 

“Third date, minimum,” Steve replies, nosing into Bucky’s hair. 

*****

Later, as he goes to leave, they’re stymied by Bucky’s departure in the doorway. It’s a simple thing really, letting go. I mean… they seem to know where they stand - things are okay. No, things are _good_ , and there’s definitely something simmering here that Steve wants to find out more about and well, Bucky is maybe on the same page, or seems like he is. And yet… they can’t seem to let go. 

“I uhm, I got a place here in Merritt,” Bucky says, leaning against the door frame and playing with the hem of Steve’s shirt. His lips are kiss-bitten and pretty and Steve can’t stop looking at them while he’s rubbing circles with his thumbs into the jut of Bucky’s hips under his jeans. 

“Yeah?” Steve manages to pull away and glance up, blinking slowly and taking in the flush on Bucky’s cheeks and ducking in for another kiss. Slow, easy, soft. 

When he pulls back, Bucky’s eyes are still closed and he’s smiling, “wanna help me move in this weekend?” 

****

“What is that?” Steve asks, hands on his hips. He pulls the gloves off that he’s been wearing to haul the last couple of boxes off the UHaul pod that Bucky had delivered in front of the apartment. It turns out they’re in the same complex, just on opposite ends which is convenient and doesn’t at all make Steve feel fluttery things about being able to walk over and borrow sugar or drop off breakfast just because. That would be stupid. 

Bucky steps out of what is … well it must have once been a car, but what it is now is …. up for debate. 

“Do you _see_ this!? Is this not the hottest car you have _ever_ seen!?” 

It could only have been more comical if the side mirror had snapped off and clattered to the ground as Bucky shut the door. Instead it seems to make a creaking, sighing sound and settles into the pavement like it’s giving up. 

“I do see it and that's why I'm walking away.” 

“She's beautiful!” 

“She's a death trap,” Steve yells back, throwing his arms into the air. 

“I'm gonna fix her up!” Bucky says. He jogs up and Steve just stares back at the sad pile of car parked in Bucky’s assigned space, “I'm going to _restore_ her to her former glory!” 

“I don't think that car ever had anything resembling glory, Buck...” Steve chances a look at Bucky and seems him beaming and then sighs. 

“She's going to be amazing, you just wait. The envy of the Cape.” 

“I highly doubt that… but I mean, stranger things….” 

“Speaking of, are we watching that tonight?” Bucky loops an arm around Steve’s hips and rests his chin on Steve’s shoulder. It’s strange - the easy affection - but Steve is trying to get used to it, trying to tell himself that he deserves it. 

“That what you want?” 

“Yeah, and bad Chinese food.” 

Bucky starts pulling them towards his open door, fingers hooking into Steve’s belt-loops as he goes. 

“What about good Chinese food?” 

“I mean, I guess, if I have to…” 

Steve laughs and pulls them both inside, the door slipping shut behind them with a polite shuffling noise that all these new places build-in to keep you from slamming them and disturbing the neighbors. There are boxes everywhere and yet, nowhere at the same time. The place still looks forebodingly empty and Steve shakes his head, looking around at everything and then kissing Bucky on the cheek, “let me go pick up dinner and your housewarming gift while you set up Netflix.” 

“Mmm.. that seems like a fair trade,” Bucky turns and catches Steve’s mouth, prolonging things for just a moment before shoving Steve towards the door. “And don’t forget the crab rangoon and eggrolls!” 

“Right, of course,” Steve waves his keys and heads out, casting one last look at Bucky’s car as he walks back towards his place across the complex. God he’s not sure about that thing… then again he has the feeling that talking Bucky out of something he really wants to do is a futile endeavor. 

Steve can’t help the strange and fond smile as he wanders across the green space around the pond. The palm trees flutter in the evening breeze and he feels a little bit nostalgic for when he first moved down. It hasn’t been so long as all that but it feels like a long time. But now it doesn’t make him sad. When he first moved down here, all he had was a sense of loss and the need to escape but over time he still found a sense of belonging to the place even if he felt a little out of time. He kept himself busy, maybe kept too much to himself on occasion, but he never felt like this wasn’t home. He knows Bucky is just getting settled and that with his job he’ll spend an awful lot of time traveling to other NASA centers and training sites but he hopes, eventually, that he’ll find that same sense of strange peace about the place that Steve does. An escape from the rest of the world, even if it’s temporary.

When Steve gets back, Bucky has managed to assemble an Ikea tv stand and set up the television and Xbox to broadcast Netflix and he’s even dragged out all his bedding and an inflatable mattress to the living room so they have something other than the floor to sit on. 

It’s a little pathetic and Steve considers offering him his own couch but he doesn’t want to make Bucky feel inadequate. So he sets down the bag of take out, and then hands Bucky a cactus. 

“My grandma always taught me that a place wasn’t really a home til it had a house plant in it,” Steve explains, and Bucky looks at that stupid cheap little cactus like it’s his new best friend and Steve thinks that maybe he’s going to do something embarrassing, so he sits down and starts unpacking the food. 

“I don’t think anyone’s ever given me a plant before,” Bucky says, setting it carefully down where he can see it while they eat dinner. “How do you even take care of a cactus?” 

“Lot of sun, little water, a bunch of leave it alone,” Steve says, handing Bucky the entire container of crab rangoon. 

“Sounds like me,” he says, reaching out and pulling Steve close by the already stretched out collar of his shirt. “Thanks for helping me move in.” 

“You’re welcome,” Steve says, smiling helplessly. 

“And for Melvin.” 

Steve’s brow furrows, “Melvin?” 

“That’s what I’ve decided to name the cactus,” Bucky says, leaning in and kissing Steve carefully, “you have to agree to come take care of him when I’m in space though.” 

“Yeah we can work something out,” Steve says casually, like his heart isn’t racing and his palms aren’t sweating at the thought that Bucky is a) going to fling himself into outer space and b) that they have a future together and c) Steve will have to wait here on Earth for him. 

It’s a lot at once and maybe he puts a little too much of that into the kiss, but Steve’s never really been that good at holding back and this is no exception. Still, they have dinner to eat and he’s not going to get distracted from that and from Stranger Things. He promised Bucky they’d watch it because Tony won’t stop making references to it in emails lately and they’re all sick of not being in on the joke. 

“Hawkins, Indiana time?” Steve says, pulling back. 

“Cockblock,” Bucky mutters darkly, grabbing another eggroll and shoving it into his mouth. 

It’s nice. The three of them. Steve, Bucky, the cactus, watching the show, making commentary, sometimes just sitting in comfortable silence. Bucky stretches out until his legs are draped over Steve’s lap and maybe… maybe Steve strokes along his calf and up to hem of his shorts. It’s not really supposed to be anything but Bucky scoots closer until he can rest his head on Steve’s shoulder. 

“Hey,” Bucky says and when Steve turns to see what he wants, Bucky cups his face and pulls him into a kiss that’s soft, but sure. “Thanks for helping me move today.” 

“You’re welcome,” Steve says, smiling a little because he knows that’s not really why Bucky is kissing him, but he’s going to let it slide. He wraps a hand around his hip and pulls their bodies closer, angling them into a more comfortable position as the episode intro rolls in the background. 

Steve isn’t sure how long they just sit there, and then _lay there_ , falling back into the air mattress and fitting against each other just so they can keep kissing. At some point Bucky makes a little noise in the back of his throat and Steve is sliding his hands up under Bucky’s shirt, spreading fingers over his lower back until Bucky arches into him and digs fingertips into Steve’s shoulders. 

“Should I stop?” Steve asks, dropping a kiss onto Bucky’s jaw and then dragging his mouth down his throat. 

“No, no, _no_ ,” Bucky whines, laughing, tipping his head back, fingers threading into Steve’s hair and pulling until Steve gets the hint and nips at an exposed collarbone. 

The response is immediate, Bucky moaning out loud and Steve… sort of accidentally bites down a little harder until he knows he’s leaving a mark and then he pulls back with a gasp and blinks down at the whole thing. 

“Shit--” 

“Steve,” Bucky whines and yanks him back down until they’re kissing, wet and messy and Bucky rolls his whole body up and Steve gets unbalanced because they’re on an _air mattress_. 

“Wait -- wait just a --” Steve groans and pulls back enough to get a breath and he thinks that’s going to be enough, but Bucky is spread out under him, his face flushed, his eyes glassy, his lips full and swollen. 

“Yeah?” Bucky’s voice is rough and his hands are still moving restlessly on Steve’s shoulders and the back of his neck. 

“I-- should probably stop before I go too far,” Steve admits. 

Bucky’s lips twitch, his nose crinkling in a show of delight and then he schools it into neutral again while Steve searches his face, hoping he hasn’t upset him. 

“What if I wanted you to go too far?” 

Steve lets out a huff of air and drops his face into Bucky’s chest with a groan, “I’m trying to take it slow and be a gentleman, Barnes!” 

Bucky laughs, running his fingers through Steve’s hair and petting him, trying to soothe him even as he’s mocking the whole situation. Steve kind of adores him, kind of has a lot of feelings about the whole thing that are tilting towards love but he’s not going to say that. 

“Yeah yeah, do you or whatever.” 

Steve manages to leave with his dignity intact, barely, and apologizes for leaving a visible hickey on Bucky’s throat, even while he’s kissing him again in the foyer and then ducking down to worry at the little bruise again, making it darker and more livid. 

“Flight suit covers it,” Bucky points out, breathing speeding up as he stands on his toes and starts grabbing hard at Steve’s biceps. 

“Don’t encourage me,” Steve growls. 

It’s maybe been awhile since he’s felt this way - this weird swell of emotion under his ribs and down in his stomach that swoops around and makes him a little unhinged and reckless. He’s not typically a reckless person by any stretch but this is like someone untying his laces and letting him free for the first time in years. It’s good - it’s really fuckin good.


	3. MER A&B Spirit and Opportunity - 2003

**[Natasha]**  
_heard you and barnes moved in together, a little fast isn’t it?_

**[Steve]**  
_i helped him move into his new place, it’s in the same complex_

**[Natasha]**  
_interesting…._

**[Steve]**  
_what?_

**[Steve]**  
_Nat!_

**[Steve]**  
_Don’t make me walk over to OPF!_

**[Steve]**  
_Oh my god…._

 

Steve ends up walking to OPF which is technically VPF now but he can never shake the old acronyms even though the new ones have been drilled into him at least seven thousand times by the ground crews. Besides, people who transitioned between the two know what he’s talking about and that’s all that matters. 

When he walks in, Natasha is leaned over her work table, scrutinizing a set of rubber seals with a couple of engineers who are making little squinty faces and talking amongst themselves in hushed tones. Natasha is interjecting every once in awhile but it seems like she’s just enjoying making them squirm. Steve appreciates that. 

He waits for a natural break in the conversation and waves to Natasha who winks at him and comes around the table. 

“Come over to see the vehicle progress?” 

“I mean, it’s done….” Steve says hesitantly, looking back at the thing that’s supposed to carry Bucky to space in the not too distant future. 

“Done, just working kinks out and troubleshooting at this point. We just got data back from emergency splashdown tests they ran on crew capsule at Langley so we’re integrating their findings now.” 

Natasha walks Steve over to what basically looks like a little shuttle and pats the side of it, “lookin’ good for an on time departure.” 

Steve narrows his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. “Sure.” 

Natasha smirks. 

“So what’s this about Bucky moving into your apartment complex?” she says, sly and smug. 

Steve clears his throat and shrugs back at her, “I mean it’s one of the nicer places around that’s still affordable so it makes sense… plus he probably likes knowing someone nearby… can’t imagine how lonely it would get otherw--” 

“Oh bull _shit_ ,” Natasha says, elbowing him in the ribs, “are you two dating or what?!” 

Steve scowls, “I don’t think it’s anyone’s business if we’re dating.” 

Natasha glances at Steve out of the corner of her eye and Steve has the distinct feeling that he’s being sized up and judged and he starts to stand up straighter. 

“It’ll be a lot of people’s business in about a year.” 

She doesn’t qualify that further, just smiles and wanders off and Steve stutters, “I … we haven’t TALKED about it yet!!” 

Natasha calls back at him, “maybe you should!” 

“Have you talked to him!?” 

She shrugs and rejoins the engineers at the table and Steve knows he’s being dismissed. 

“Fuck,” he hisses. 

“Hey buddy!” 

Steve jumps as Clint rolls out from underneath one of the wings and waves a tool at him. 

“You alright?” 

“I mean I was, until you just gave me a small heart attack.” 

“You’ll survive,” Clint grins. 

Steve crouches down and glances at the heat shield tiles on the underside, “how’s this thing doing?” 

“So far? Perfect,” Clint says, rolling himself back and forth, “it’s more sophisticated than the Shuttle heat shield and safer than Dream Chaser so … we have high hopes for it. Nothing is foolproof in space but it’s testing way above where we thought it would be.” 

“Hm,” Steve runs his hand over a seam and tries not to think about the future. “When are they going to do preliminary roll out?” 

“On a test stack?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Probably in the next six months. They want to do a few more thermo-tests before they mount it on boosters and take it to the pad, the usual… you know.” 

“Yeah…” Steve kind of drifts off and remembers when he was a lot more on top of this thing. Shuttles were his main love of course. Not that he doesn’t have a soft spot for any kind of manned space flight out of the US but there was something about ‘space plane’ that just sort of stuck with him. He’s trying to get used to the mounted X-breed they have now but it’s a little weird still. “Hey I’ll see you later - I was … I was thinking about having everyone over for a thing .. I don’t know a pot luck or something?” 

“At your place?” 

“Yeah. it’s been awhile, figured I’d let you guys come back even after the disaster from last time.” 

“Aw, it’s like you actually love us.” 

“Don’t go that far.” 

Clint laughs and slides back under the vehicle as Steve straightens up, “I’ll text the group chat.” 

“Should make a new one,” Clint yells. 

“What?” 

“Yeah - add Barnes!” 

Steve blushes because the sentiment has been shouted across the entire VPF and Natasha is looking at him with that superbly smug look on her face that says she knows what’s going on and Steve clears his throat and marches himself directly back outside, shoving his wayfarers down onto his face and pretending like everyone at NASA doesn’t know his fucking business. 

*****

The phone is ringing. It’s 1 am and his phone is ringing which is ...absurd...even if it is a Friday night, he wanted to get some rest. I mean, he has some limits. Still, what if it’s an emergency? Steve has the presence of mind to answer but not enough of one to see who it is before a muzzy, “Hello?” is pressed into what he hopes is the right end of the iphone. 

“Hey… I’m … I’m sorry it’s so early or late? I was burning up and the power is out in half the complex? I think a transformer blew but my A/C is off--” 

“Come on over, s’fine,” Steve answers, sitting up in bed and blinking at the alarm clock on the nightstand. He can hear rain outside which means there was probably a lightning strike. “You on your way?” 

“I’m outside your door,” Bucky says sheepishly. 

Steve snorts and goes out to let him in, hanging up the phone as he twists the lock, standing back to let Bucky in and making a pleasant sound when Bucky crowds him into the foyer, kissing him all soft and sweet. 

“Hey, m’sorry,” Bucky whispers, stepping back so they can shut and lock the door again. 

“S’okay,” Steve says, smiles and threads his fingers into Bucky’s and pulls him towards the bedroom, nudging him towards the unmade bed. “Lay down in here, I’ll take the couch.” 

“Mmm -- mm mm,” Bucky shakes his head and tugs until Steve’s legs hit the edge of the bed, “stay here, we’ll keep it Disney movie.” 

Steve huffs out a quiet laugh, but is too tired to say anything else, to fight it or make a token protest. Instead he sinks into the mattress and spoons up behind Bucky, wrapping an arm around his middle and pressing his face into the back of his neck. Maybe if he were more awake he would think too much into this, would lay awake too long and wonder if this was too fast or ruin the moment with too many questions. Instead his thumb traces under the hem of Bucky’s shirt and Bucky presses back into him with a sigh. 

“This is my favorite kind of weather,” Steve says, voice still rough with sleep. 

“Because it kills the power and I come crawling into bed with you?” 

Steve can’t help the smile, brushing his lips over the back of Bucky’s neck and into his hair. “Yeah that’s not a bad side effect.” 

They’re quiet for a time, Steve leaving soft touches wherever his fingers can reach and Bucky rolled back into his chest, eyes heavy and drooping. 

“I like it too,” Bucky says, his voice quiet and soft like the rain on the screens, “I grew up here, left for awhile. Came back for school. But I never stopped thinking about the rain on the palm trees.” 

They can see the flash of lightning around the edges of the curtains, the roll of thunder quick behind it. And over that there’s the rain battering the palm trees, just like Bucky says, the unique sound of Florida weather that Steve is in love with just as much. 

“Makes me never want to leave bed,” Steve admits. He feels rather than hears Bucky’s soft laugh and that’s what he falls asleep to. 

At seven a phone goes off and Steve groans, coiling tighter around the weight in his arms. Bucky makes an equally angry noise at the disruption of sleep. 

“Fuck.. we’re supposed to fly this morning--” 

“It’s raining…” Steve mutters, pushing his face into Bucky’s shoulder. 

“Isit?” Bucky squints into the grey morning of the room behind the black out curtains and finally has to get out of bed and pull a corner back to check for himself. Steve watches him and rubs a hand absently over the indent left behind in the sheets, still warm from where he just was. When the curtain swishes out of the way, a shaft of light comes into the room and Steve snorts. 

“Guess not?” 

“Gross,” Bucky wrinkles his nose and turns around, watching Steve as Steve watches him. 

“Why don’t you … take a shower here - in case your power is still out - and you can borrow some sweats or something, they’ll give you a suit once you get there anyways if you’re going in the T-38.” 

“Mm, tempting,” Bucky says, crawling over the bed and kissing Steve on the cheek, “this isn’t some ploy to try and keep me here all morning is it?” 

Steve shrugs, eyes already closing, “might be… m’gonna sleep another thirty minutes .. towels’re in the closet, help yourself baby.” 

The last thing he notices is Bucky’s crooked smile and he thinks he hears water turning on but he’s not really sure. 

He does hear the water cut off and he blinks awake fast, cursing himself for waiting so long. Steve jumps out of bed fast, rifling through his drawers and leaving out some clothes for Bucky to borrow on his bed and then rushing to the kitchen while shouting “clothes are in my room for you!” 

The good news is, Steve keeps his house pretty tidy so it’s not like he has to clean up but he does take the time to put on a drip pot of coffee and then grabs some eggs and bacon out of the fridge and a loaf of bread out of the pantry. It feels stupid and a little over the top but he wants to impress Bucky and he’s one of those people that shows affection through gifts and food and showing up. He’s bad at saying how he feels a lot of the time but he sort of hopes that this makes up for that. 

“Hey you,” Bucky comes around the corner through the dining room and smiles when he sees Steve. 

“Thought I’d try and put a little food in you before they put you to work all day,” Steve says sheepishly. 

Bucky gives him that same soft smile that Steve swears he saw earlier, right before he fell asleep and he wants to figure out just how he goes about making that look stay on there all the time. 

*****

Steve… was one of those old NASA diehards. It wasn’t that he’d been with the agency since the 60s but sometimes people joked that he had founded NACA in 1915 and been there ever since. Steve believed in the dream, wasn't jaded about much and expected the job to be done and be done well. He still had a blackboard in his office and it proudly proclaimed “Tough and Competent” at the top in his small, neat chalked writing. He had models of every rocket NASA had ever launched and a 1/100th scale of the Saturn V. There were rumors he worshiped that statue like an idol and that Gene Kranz was the God he prayed to but none of that was confirmed. 

He wore button down shirts with a tie tucked into pressed slacks every day. His shoes were shined, his belt was the right size and his hair was perfect. The bookshelf in his office was filled with procedure, research and protocol and in order by year. The cork board next to his desk had every mission patch he'd launched and landed and in a frame next to his phone was a picture of him and Buzz Aldrin. 

 

Or that was what Steve … used to be. 

No one was quite certain when it happened or what happened, but slowly the old built in pride started to wane. Steve himself never ceased to be the epitome of perfection, but some of the love of the agency had started to fade. At first when the rockets began to disappear he said he just needed more space on his desk, and then it had turned into “well they were a distraction anyways” to “I sold them, I needed the cash.” It was never confirmed what happened to them, all anyone knew now is that they weren't there anymore. 

The only thing that stuck around was “Tough and Competent.” 

Steve glances up from his monitor, cross checks it with the paperwork and then sighs deeply because he’s not getting out of this one alive. 

Bucky is sat on the other side of the desk and grinning at Steve. 

“Do you know what today is?” 

Steve looks up and raises his eyebrows in question. 

“That's right, it's tour day~” Bucky manages to sing-song the entire phrase and Steve rolls his eyes, “c'mon let's get an early start.” 

“I see no reason to drag me around this complex other than for your sick sense of enjoyment,” Steve holds up his dossier and shakes it in emphasis, “I have a job to do, work, that thing that gets your ass off the ground and into space?”

“Blah, blah, blah, blah – yeah whatever, get up, punk we're going for a walk.” Bucky reaches over the desk and hauls Steve up at the elbow, watching in perverse joy as papers slither out of place and sticky notes and paperclips clatter to the ground. 

“Damnit, Bucky, I-” 

“Walking, we're walking, we're waaaalking,” Bucky smirks and pulls, waiting until he has Steve stepping out of the door with his sunglasses on. 

They were an amusing pair. Steve in his business attire, Bucky looking like some beached hooligan that had gotten lost on the way to Ron Jon. They have all the access in the world but Bucky for what is some unfathomable reason makes Steve get on the regular ticketed access bus and ride with sweaty, angry tourists who are sunburnt and likely on the road to skin cancer. 

“Oh this is my favorite part-” Bucky is kicked back with his legs propped up watching the video on the tour bus and staunchly disregarding the death glares the driver is giving him for eating goldfish crackers during the drive. 

Steve is sitting with his arms crossed over his chest, sunglasses on and mouth drawn into a look of neutral disdain.

“You know, you look like secret service when you do that.” 

“Keeps people from bothering me.” 

Bucky grins and starts jabbing Steve at intervals with his elbow mumbling “bother bother bother bother bother” over and over again until Steve hooks an arm around his throat and squeezes enough that Bucky almost drops his crackers on the floor. 

“H-- hey you don't want to upset Martin do you? You know,” he pauses to wheeze in a breath, “how he hates food on his floors. C'mon Rogers-” 

“Are you going to stop bothering me?” 

Bucky hisses out an affirmative and Steve lets him go, listening with satisfaction as he coughs a couple of times next to him. 

_We're now approaching the Saturn V complex where-_

“I fuckin' LOVE this building!” Bucky bounces in his seat and stuffs his remaining crackers down into a pocket, leaning over Steve to press his face against the bus window, “most powerful rocket ever built yes yes yes!” 

“Actually, I think the new-”

“Don't ruin it for me, Steve.” 

Steve shrugs, “just trying to be accurate.” 

“More like a killjoy. C'mon let's go.” 

The first room you walk into is standing only and you watch a movie about the advent of the space program, the early years of Apollo. Steve pushes his sunglasses up into his hair and stands just to the side so that as the lights go down he can watch Bucky. He’s seen this movie a thousand times and he knows Bucky has too but for Bucky, it seems like every time is the first. Steve watches as his lips tremble a little and form the words to the entire monologue. He can see him mimic the whole of Kennedy’s Rice University speech excerpt: 

“We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.” 

Steve watches the goosebumps rise over Bucky’s bare arms, how he swipes at them like he’s cold and not that he’s moved by the speech even after all this time and Steve glances down just to smile to himself. He can’t help it. It’s like looking at the sun, you’ll go blind if you stare directly at it and yet here he is. 

When they move into the Launch Control room simulation, Steve gives up all pretense of being interested in the show of it at all and instead he just watches Bucky. He watches his eyes shine and watches his mouth move to silently pay homage to every word the people in the recording speak. He watches his fingers tighten on the railing as they show the Saturn V lift off and most of all he watches as he smiles, recklessly and in pure joy and excitement as the windows behind them shake and the footage rolls on. 

Bucky never gave up. It had never made Bucky bitter. Not the budget cuts and allocations, not political quagmire, not accidents and not the apathy of the American people. Which is really what did Steve in. 

It wasn't the end of the shuttle program, wasn't Apollo 1, STS-51 or STS-107; wasn't the requested budget justifications that made his old job obsolete... no, it was some jackass at Publix who said NASA was a waste of money. 

It was the school he spoke at where the 12th grade class concurred on one sentiment: what's the point?

It was his cousin Alan who referred to Kennedy Space Center as a theme park and said the only useful thing to come out of NASA was that ride at Universal Studios. 

At first Steve had been righteously indignant. How dare these uneducated cretins be allowed to go on thinking NASA has never impacted their lives. How dare they, for _one minute_ , think it was worthless, that the money spent was wasted, that the programs were a failure. 

That people had died in vain. 

Grissom, White, Chaffee, Husband, McCool, Ramon, McAuliffe, Onizuka... how could anyone call their contributions anything less than extraordinary? How? 

And yet, after so many years it had beat him down. It had made him stop believing. After all, when everyone else gives up hope – it's only a matter of time before you do too.

Except… Bucky didn’t. 

The doors between the simulation and the rocket housing open and Bucky waits until everyone else has filed out before he meanders over and lets out a shaky exhale. 

“We sent man to the moon on that thing,” he says, gesturing over his shoulder, like Steve isn’t well aware. “7.6 million pounds of thrust at liftoff… and we put people on top of it and like a slingshot, sent them to the moon.” 

His eyes are bright and sincere and Steve wants to kiss him so bad it aches. Instead he licks his lips and ducks his head. 

“Well, some people say we didn’t actually go to the moon…” Steve says, trying to hide a smile.

“Yeah and Buzz Aldrin punches them in the fuckin’ face like they deserve,” Bucky says darkly, bumping Steve’s shoulder and brushing his fingers against his forearm. “Come on, I wanna go touch the moon rock.” 

For someone who has the clearance to go roll around in a bin of actual honest-to-god regolith, Bucky takes an immense amount of perverse joy in touching the publicly available sliver of moon rock and forces Steve to take several pictures of him so that he can put the best one on Instagram. 

“That thing is probably covered in germs,” Steve says, checking the latest picture and glancing up as Bucky comes back over to him, “I hope you know we’re going to the bathroom right now so you can wash your hands before you contract something.” 

Bucky snorts and pretends to lick all over his palm with a dramatic sound effect and Steve grimaces, “if you catch a cold they’ll boot you off training.” 

“Yeah alright,” Bucky concedes, shuffling to the men’s room as Steve waits in the gift shop. They don’t sell anything with ‘Bucky’ on it, but he picks out a generic coffee mug that says ‘James’ and a stuffed moon and a couple of other things that he wants to spoil him with before he can get caught at it. The sales lady is polite enough to not ask questions when he shoves cash at her and tells her to wrap it up and not let his friend see it. 

He’s feeling some kind of way and for once he’s trying not to repress that and let it roll over him. 

They take the extended tour past the shuttle landing runway, and there’s a couple of T-38s out there. Bucky kicks back and leans his head against Steve’s shoulder, dropping his weight into Steve’s side until Steve sighs and slings an arm around him, fingers carding through his hair. The sun is just starting to sink so that everything is beautiful and golden-hued and perfect. 

*****

When they get back to his office the door is open a crack and he frowns but it might just be another person on his team getting into his archives. Bucky is suspiciously quiet, walking a few steps behind and Steve starts to tease him about really getting into this whole ‘not wanting to be seen together in the office’ thing but he opens his office door and his heart feels like it’s falling out of his chest. 

Around the office are a collection of his old rockets. The models he collected when he was a kid all the way up to the fancy ones he got through the agency. They’ve been meticulously cleaned and set up all around the room, the empty shelves filled once again. He doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know how to feel, just that his heart stops and then starts pumping in a completely different rhythm than before. 

“Clint helped me set them up but I… I borrowed your spare key -- that day the power went out I--” 

Steve turns and Bucky is standing there looking so unsure of himself that he almost doesn’t look real. 

“--I was looking for a towel but I found them in a box in the bottom of the closet, I’m sorry I wasn’t trying to snoop… it just... “ he shrugs, helplessly and Steve gives him a look like he can’t believe he’d do this. 

“Don’t give up,” Bucky says quietly, stepping into the office doorway until he’s almost chest to chest with Steve. 

“On what?” Steve asks, voice rough. 

“On this, all of it,” Bucky says. He glances around Steve’s office and back out to the other offices where anyone could see them and then he slides a hand along Steve’s waist, squeezing, “I know it’s not what you thought it would be, I know you get bent out of shape sometimes about it … I know it wears you down but Steve… _space_.” 

"I didn't give up on it I just-" 

"You shoved it in a closet!' 

"Yeah, alright I did!" 

"So don't do _that_. Be excited about it." Bucky wraps his arm around Steve and hugs him, turns his head so he can look at all the rockets and models and Steve hugs him back. Puts his head on top of Bucky’s and rubs between his shoulder blades. 

“I guess,” Steve mutters. 

“For me, Rogers… do it for me.” 

They’re quiet and contemplative and maybe forget where they are and Steve has never been public about his personal life at work … clearly… but for once he doesn’t feel like he has to hide it, and he doesn’t _want_ to hide it either. 

*****

Maybe that’s when they officially let the cat out of the bag, or maybe it’s a week or so later at drinks night when Bucky is buying another round and kisses Steve in front of everyone when he brings him back a cherry coke and tells him he’s fucking adorable. There’s also the pot luck that Steve has at his house where Bucky, after a few glasses of red wine, sprawls over his lap in the corner of the couch and stage whispers ‘when everyone leaves I want dessert.’ The face that Clint makes at that is something that Steve will probably never forget and honestly he won’t forget the way that later, Bucky is pressing him back into the couch when they’re alone and whispering ‘how far can we go tonight?’ while slipping a hand inside of Steve’s shirt. In the end it’s actually just a collection of all those things, where people just know that they’re official, that they’re together, that they want each other, that they’re _something._

And they still take things interminably slow, half because they want to and half because Bucky is an astronaut and he’s flying all over, training and doing. At one point Steve jokes that Bucky’s car is going to be restored before they ever get past third base. It’s while Bucky is in Russia at the Cosmodrome and Bucky laughs down the line with heat in his voice and then says ‘I promise that won’t happen.’ Steve groans and when he hangs up the phone he tries not to think of what that means or what Bucky is thinking about as he goes into the simulation in Russia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some Glossary notes for y'all: 
> 
> OPF - Orbiter Processing Facility - it's where the space shuttles came in for turnover between missions. VPF is "vehicle processing facility" and is a made-up acronym because that's not what that building is called anymore! ARTISTIC LIBERTY!  
> [JSC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnson_Space_Center) \- Johnson Space Center located in Houston Texas; JSC is where the hub of mission activity is in terms of mission operations since it houses...  
> [MCC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mission_control_center) \- Mission Control Center or just Mission Control  
> [KSC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Space_Center) \- Kennedy Space Center located in Cape Canaveral/Merritt Island Florida is where most of your big launches take place. It's not the ONLY location NASA launches from but it's where most of the primary rocket launches take place and where all the crewed launches tend to go from unless we're going out of Russia...  
> [Langley](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Langley_Research_Center) \- or Langley Research Center is in Hampton Virginia and notably where a great deal of NASA's hardware testing is done. When they were doing splashdown testing on the Apollo and then the early Orion prototypes this is where it was at.  
> [Ames](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ames_Research_Center) \- Ames Research Center is in Silicon Valley California; it houses a lot of various research areas but in my humble opinion the astrobiology and habitable planets stuff is the coolest.  
> [LC (or LCC)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Launch_Control_Center)\- Launch Control. This is located at KSC. Even though MCC is in Houston -the rockets take off at KSC and thus need ground support until a certain point of mission is reached. I won't go into too many details lol. The point is, Launch Control basically acts as Mission Control until that point, gets the rocket cleared for take out kind of like ATC (Air Traffic Control ;) ) and then the mission moves into MCC. Kennedy also has control over landing of certain craft like the Shuttle ...  
> [The Cape](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Canaveral_Air_Force_Station) \- Cape Canaveral Florida the hub of launch activity and the launch of crewed spaceflight since the sixties. Anyways The Cape isn't just KSC it's also the Canaveral AFB which launches other uh, missions.  
> [Pad 34 or LC-34](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cape_Canaveral_Air_Force_Station_Launch_Complex_34) \- the location of the Apollo 1 Plugs Out test. You can visit the pad as a tourist but it requires special ticketing and a bused escort. There's a memorial there. It's quiet and solemn and a reminder that spaceflight isn't for the faint of heart.  
> [ Apollo 1](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_1) \- January 27, 1967; Apollo 1 is doing a routine plugs out test on Pad 34 at KSC. There is a fire sparked from wiring in the cockpit of the capsule and the all-oxygen environment inside means that the fire burns deadly hot at unstoppable speeds. The door can't be opened and all three men perish in the blaze.  
> [STS-51L](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-51-L) \- January 28, 1986; Challenger exploded just after liftoff from KSC. After the words 'go for throttle up' there was an o-ring failure in the SRB/ET lines. All the astronauts on board perished.  
> [STS-107](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS-107) \- February 1, 2003; Columbia disintegrated during re-entry over the United States. Heat shield tiles that had been damaged from ET foam falling away during liftoff had hit the leading wing edge and when they had come back to earth, the vehicle was compromised. All crew perished.  
> [SLF](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shuttle_Landing_Facility) \- Shuttle Landing Facility; This is the shuttle runway which is different from most other landing strips because it's VERY FUCKING LONG. The shuttle doesn't actually have any onboard thrust or engines like an airplane so to slow down it can only glide and descend. That said it's going 17,500 mph in space so it has a LOT OF SLOWING DOWN TO DO. Even with several loops and the burn going in through the atmosphere, you usually get 2 sonic booms over the state of Florida when she comes home. It takes forever to drive down.  
> [Tough and Competent](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Eugene_F._Kranz) \- Following the Apollo 1 Fire, Flight Director Gene Kranz went back to his offices and brought in everyone in control and basically read them the riot act. It's called the the Kranz Dictum and is relatively famous among NASA people. The entirety of the speech is at the link and it's worth a read.


	4. Phoenix - 2007

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hello friends, things get a little more intense from here on out. 
> 
> Please buckle your safety belts and remember to secure your oxygen mask before helping others; and remember, though the bag may not inflate, oxygen _is_ flowing.

Steve knocks on the door and wonders when he turned seventeen again. Steve rocks back on his heels and shoves his hands down into his back pockets. There’s a faint _’hold on-- coming, well--’_ and a broken off laugh before the door is flung open and Bucky is standing in front of him with his shirt unbuttoned and his toothbrush hanging out of his mouth. 

Steve leans in and kisses him on the cheek instead. 

“Showwy,” Bucky says, dashing back towards his bathroom as Steve shuts the door behind them. He hasn’t really been over to Bucky’s place much since he unpacked everything which was after the last trip to Russia. He hadn’t been great about setting things up and well, if Steve was being honest, most of the time they spent together was over at his place. Bucky complained that his didn’t feel like home yet. Steve understood but he also tried to counter with the fact that if Bucky never spent time at his own place it would never feel particularly like a home. 

Then again, Steve was pretty loathe to spend that much time apart when they had it these days. They were getting closer to launch. 

“I shouldn't be surprised you're running late, and yet...” 

Bucky just shrugs with a foamy smile, leaning his head out of the bathroom and Steve shakes his head, smiling and looking around at the place. There was a serious lack of furniture… and what _was_ there was … hm… what was a nice word for it. Salvaged? It had a salvaged look about it. Not that there was anything wrong with upcycling, Steve had a few pieces in his own apartment that he’d rescued off loading docks and such, but something about Bucky’s just screamed “I pulled this directly out of a dumpster and maybe didn’t even wipe it off after that.” 

The couch at least looked nice, a huge leather affair that put Steve’s to shame, actually. The stuffed moon he bought Bucky is sitting there with a throw pillow and Steve tries not to be sentimental at that. Still, the couch is comfortable and has a throw across the back that Steve touches. It looks to be hand-knit and it falls away into his palms, mismatched yarn and all, revealing … the huge hole in the back center cushion of the couch that looks like it’s been eaten away by a polar bear. 

He doesn’t want to know. 

Maybe while Bucky is away at training or something, Steve can surprise him with uh, a nicer coffee table or repaint the one he has at the very least. 

Steve refolds the blanket and sets it back over the gaping hole and then sits down, glancing at the magazines spread out over the table, surprised when he comes back with _Popular Mechanics_ , _National Geographic_ and _Scientific American_. Not exactly what he expected to find. 

As Bucky comes back around the corner, finishing the last few buttons on his shirt Steve holds up the magazines and gives him a funny look, “I didn't know you could read.” 

“Nah, I just keep them around for looks – makes people think I'm smart,” Bucky winks and snatches them away from Steve, scattering them onto the coffee table and grabbing Steve’s hand to pull him off the couch, “c'mon, let's get out before it's your bedtime. When is that by the way? 8?” 

“Haha... very funny..” 

“I know, right?” 

As they step out into the cooler evening air, Bucky locking up after them, Steve glances sideways at him, “where are we going again?” 

“Dementia setting in early?” 

Steve rolls his eyes. 

“Hitting up a local dive for some food and then maybe after a few drinks we can fumble back here and pass out drunkenly in compromising positions and pretend we don't know what happened in the morning. The usual.” 

“That only happened once.” 

“That was a very formative experience in our relationship, Stevie. How can I ever trust you again?” Bucky fakes being put out and then laughs at the expression of confusion on Steve’s face, “just.. get in the car.” 

“You're driving!?” 

“Novel idea, this whole car thing. I forget, do they have cars in Georgia or are you still going everywhere on horseback and in buggies?” 

“That's the Amish, jackass.” 

“Oooooh... hard to tell the difference sometimes.”

Steve stands in front of Bucky’s car and gives it a look. It’s not in quite the same terrible shape it was when Bucky got it but it’s not exactly in peak condition either. Steve’s been watching it come and go into various specialty shops since it arrived when Bucky doesn’t have the time or capacity to do something himself. And alright it’s a BMW 507 and Steve knows that if it were in mint condition it’d be worth a fortune. 

“Does it even turn over?” 

“Does it -- Steve, for fuck’s sake get in,” Bucky snipes. 

Steve sighs and opens the door, having to stoop down but then kind of regretting some of the nasty things he’s said about the car in the past few weeks because it looks like while the exterior still has some work to be done, the inside is… well. Fuck. 

“Jesus….” Steve runs his hands over the dashboard, carefully touches the seat leather and kind of takes in the whole thing as Bucky gives him a knowing smirk. 

“You still want to talk shit about my best girl?” 

“Should I be jealous?” Steve asks, opening the glove box and then stroking over the brown leather detailing and shaking his head. 

“I mean, yeah probably, I do spend a lot of money on her…” Bucky says, turning over the engine as Steve sighs and buckles up. 

“Guess that means you finished the rebuild on that then, huh?” 

“You could say that,” Bucky says, “still have some fine tuning to do but she gets from point A to point B without dropping the clutch so that’s a start.” 

Steve covers his face and then pinches the bridge of his nose, “please tell me you’re going to fix that before you get the paint done?” 

“Oh yeah obviously.” 

They pull out into traffic and Steve chances a glance over at Bucky in the dim light of the vintage dials and the street lights through the windows. He’s never seen anything as beautiful as the man next to him when he’s happy and it scares him a little because he knows that in another month or so he has to put him on top of a rocket and send him to space. Not just space like, low earth orbit, checking things out, but he’s going to the lunar base and things can Go Wrong. 

He spends a lot of time trying not to dwell on the things that can happen because he doesn’t have any kind of control over them, and he doesn’t want to waste what little time they have with him in some kind of an angry rut just rolling over and over the horrifying realities that might come to pass. Steve is having to retrain himself to live in the very present, the now of it all. It’s hard because he’s never done that before and he’s always thought too much about the past or the white picket fence future; but with Bucky he’s thinking about how he wants to spend an awful long time with him but the only way he can do that is by living in the moment. 

When they turn off at the Port Canaveral exit, Steve knows where they’re going and he sighs, shaking his head with a poorly suppressed grin. 

“Really?” 

Bucky smiles at him as he blinkers off the exit, “it’s tradition.” 

And it is. 

*****

Technicians had fixed the launch issue and they were pressing on with the countdown that afternoon. Fueling was underway and everything looked good. For once, the weather was cooperating and they had the green light. 

Steve settles into his seat and watches as the updates start rolling in. Since he’s not on active launch crew he’s free to take the time to catch the launch as a spectator and it just so happens someone has slipped him a VIP badge and he’s not going to pass up that opportunity. 

Just as he’s composing himself and finding a nice spot in the back close to a table full of drinks that he’s trying to decide if he can help himself to, he hears someone’s throat clear. 

The door swings open to his far left and he retracts his hand from where it’s hovering over the bottled waters and instead he tucks both hands into the pockets of his slacks. God knows he doesn’t want to be caught out by an agency director or anything. And just as the thought is crossing his mind, Bucky walks in flanked by some of the most important people in the agency. 

It’s like he’s a prize winning show dog - which Steve guesses, he kind of is at this point. Their newest recruit to the astronaut corps, he’s young, good looking, getting a lot of media and PR attention … and he’s talented as hell. 

“Rogers! Excellent, glad to see you here.” Steve straightens up and clears his throat, withdrawing a hand from his pocket and shaking the outstretched palm of the administrator.

“Sir.” 

Pierce smiles and pushes Bucky forward; the latter of which is wearing a shit-eating grin, “I wanted to introduce you to someone, this is James Buchanan Barnes, he's one of our up and coming astronaut recruits.” 

Steve reaches out, playing along and shaking Bucky’s hand, trying to act professional, “pleasure.” 

“All mine,” Bucky purrs, squeezing Steve's hand and delighting in how Steve goes red. Thankfully Pierce doesn’t notice and blithely goes on, extolling the many virtues of James B. Barnes, Astronaut to the rest of the room. 

Steve shakes his head and hangs back. Ends up going for that bottle of water after all. 

When the shine has worn off and Bucky gets a break, he sidles to the back of the room and leans against the wall next to Steve. 

“Pleasure to meet you? Really?” 

Steve snorts into his water, “thought you’d like that?” 

“Oh I did, it was just hard to keep a straight face.” 

“You mean you haven’t discussed with the head of NASA your current uh --” Steve fumbles over the words and Bucky casts a look over at him, not too amused judging by the way his eyebrow cocks up and he crosses his arms over his chest. 

“‘My current uh?’” he taunts, “no I haven’t discussed anything with NASA Administrator Alexander Pierce other than how much I enjoy my current job and how thrilled I am to be part of the team.” 

“You know what I--” 

“I don’t know what you mean,” Bucky says, voice a little short. 

It takes Steve by surprise and he’s about to ask what it means when Pierce is calling Bucky towards the patio -- everyone else making the move towards the doors so they can watch the launch outside. They’re just breaking out of the final built in hold before the last countdown starts and everyone is getting cameras and cell phones ready. 

Steve tries to give Bucky space but he’s excited just like everyone else is. They end up on the railing close to each other, but it’s not too suspicious, there’s a few other people around and Pierce is there with the Deputy Admin and the head of Ops at KSC so he’s not overly focused on just what Bucky is doing or who he’s talking to right that second. Besides, as they get to the final 20 seconds, there’s only one thing in the room commanding anyone’s attention. 

As the speakers play the official countdown and the words “go for launch” are broadcast, everyone claps and cheers. Ignition is a very special thing, something you may have seen 100 times but it still takes your breath away. The rockets are so bright they make the mid-day sun look dim and God, it’s so loud when the sound hits you that it can shake the clothes off your body. Steve smiles, can’t quite help it and leans over the railing to take a few pictures on his phone. 

“I love this,” Bucky says just as the rocket takes off from the pad and it’s before the soundwave hits so Steve can actually hear him. But the thing that sits with him and makes him feel funny afterwards is the fact that Bucky wasn’t looking at the Delta IV Heavy when he said it. He was looking at _Steve_. 

*****

Bucky doesn’t get in until late that night and Steve knows because they had a kind of standing date to ‘hang out’ when Bucky got done with all the ‘schmoozing’ with the agency higher ups. It’s a little past midnight when Steve is woken up by his phone going off and he answers in a haze. Bucky’s tipsy, not slurring his words, but he’s doing that thing where he’s trying desperately to be quiet but he’s too drunk to tell just how loud he’s really being as he informs Steve that he’s right outside the door. 

“I thought you had a key?” Steve says, wrapping an arm around Bucky’s shoulders as he walks in and burying his face into his neck. 

“Mmm, left it after I stole the rockets. Didn’t feel right keepin’ it,” Bucky mumbles back, hands slipping up under the back of Steve’s shirt, fingers digging in a little. 

“Wouldn’t care if you did.” 

Steve tries to maneuver them towards bed, the two of them stumbling over each other and around one another until Bucky slams down into the covers with an ‘oomph’ and Steve wobbles collapsing half on top of him. 

“Hey,” Bucky says, wrapping an arm back around him. 

“How was the,” Steve trails off and makes a jerking off motion with one hand. Bucky snorts. 

“Not quite _that_ satisfying.” 

Steve nods, tired and confused, and peels himself up so he can slide to the ground and help Bucky out of his clothes in what is probably the least sexually charged strip tease he’s ever been a part of. They collapse into the bed and in the dark, where secrets are kept and carried, Bucky breathes out into one of the pillows: 

“What _are_ we?” 

Steve stares up at the ceiling and blinks a few times trying to figure out if that’s directed at him, if Bucky’s awake or if this is some kind of lucid dream. Then again Bucky is kind of drunk and maybe right now isn’t a good time to answer this sort of question because it needs a certain level of nuance that he’s not quite sure he’s capable of. 

Fuck. 

Steve rolls to his side and spoons up behind Bucky, burying his face between his shoulder blades and closing his eyes. 

“Talk in the morning.” 

Bucky grunts and Steve tries to sleep but it takes a long time to get there. He knows that they can’t have this conversation now, but with the possibility hanging between them, Steve is spiraling a little. Is this where he finally puts himself out there? God he really needs to get his shit together it’s not like this should be difficult; it’s just talking to a guy who clearly doesn’t _hate_ spending time together and in the end maybe he doesn’t feel _exactly_ the same way but … but Steve isn’t sure he can go on living his life without ever knowing. Fake it ‘til you make it only works so long. Pretending otherwise … that would be stupid. 

Right? 

 

*****

Steve wakes up to Bucky mouthing hot and wet at his throat, and his higher cognitive function shuts off and transfers blood flow elsewhere. 

“Hnghfuck--” 

“G’morning,” Bucky groans, wrapping an arm around Steve’s waist and dragging him back until their hips are pressed tight together and there’s no question about just how Bucky feels this morning. Oh God they were supposed to have a serious conversation; they were supposed to clear things up and Bucky is slipping a hand over the front of Steve’s sleep pants and palming him and Steve is melting back into him with a slutty moan. “ _Oh_ , a _very_ good morning.” 

Steve can’t help it, he rocks back into Bucky’s erection, and chases the friction that Bucky’s hand is giving him through his pants and tries not to overthink anything. They can talk over breakfast instead - they can talk tonight - fuck they can talk any other time that isn’t _right now oh fuck right now_ \- because right now Bucky is getting rough and shoving Steve’s sleep pants down and out of the way and getting a handful of his ass.

“Kinda been thinkin’ bout this a lot,” Bucky whispers, teeth catching on Steve’s ear as his fingers dig into Steve’s ass, “thought about you bending me over your dining room table or hell maybe your office desk--” 

“Oh--” Steve lets out an embarrassingly loud moan at that and can feel Bucky’s smirk against the side of his throat. 

“Yeah, you _like_ that, huh?” 

Really at this point Steve is beginning to think he’d agree to liking anything if it means that Bucky doesn’t stop touching him like this, stop giving him exactly what it is he wants. 

“Inside me,” Steve groans, rocking his hips back and biting his lip. He can feel Bucky shudder and then there are teeth grazing along his shoulder, hands flexing against his sides as Bucky lines himself up and lets his cock slide in between Steve’s cheeks for the friction. 

“Fuck I want that,” Bucky hisses, rocking forward and holding Steve still so he can take what he needs and Steve hasn’t been with someone who can do that to him in a very long time. “Roll over.” 

Steve slips onto his stomach and Bucky follows, the two of them moving all tangled up in the covers, Bucky struggling to reach for the lube and condoms and Steve actually letting himself be vulnerable in a way that he hasn’t let himself be in a long time… and maybe that’s a good thing. 

“Two or three?” Bucky asks, kneeling between Steve’s thighs and already working two fingers deep inside of him until Steve is rocking back on them with little aborted thrusts and hitched moans. 

“Three,” Steve pants, his head down and pressed to the cool sheets. “Like being full.” 

“Fuck you can’t just say shit like that,” Bucky whines, pulling two fingers out and pushing three back in and making Steve’s back curve until his ass in in the air. He thinks about being embarrassed but Bucky is curving his fingers inside of him and rubbing against his prostate until there’s honestly nothing left in his head but static. He fists his hands in the sheets and groans, gritting his teeth as he feels his balls tighten. 

“In me, c’mon Buck--” 

“Impatient, aren’t you?” Bucky says but his voice is a dead giveaway - the way it hitches and catches as he withdraws his fingers and tears open the condom to slick it onto his own aching erection. 

Steve takes a moment to glance back over his shoulder and isn’t disappointed in the view, his eyes rake down Bucky’s body and he takes a minute or two to think about how this is his, presumably. Bucky sinks into him slow at first and then bottoms out with a groan, draping himself over Steve’s back so he can nose into his hair and rock into his ass. It’s not hard or rough, but it’s deep and thorough and it has Steve gasping against the pillows and angling his hips for more friction and penetration both. 

“Bucky -- Bucky _please_ ,” Steve groans, getting the leverage to push back and meet the roll of Bucky’s hips so that there’s a slap of skin on skin in the dark of their room. 

“How do you want it, sweetheart?” Bucky asks, his voice hot against Steve’s ear as he never once stops moving, filling Steve relentlessly. 

“More,” Steve manages to grit out and isn’t sure how to quantify that further but Bucky seems to get it, propping himself up on one arm and pulling out further to start fucking Steve harder. It has Steve digging into the blankets until his knuckles are white and he can feel the orgasm building up faster and faster. Part of him wants to drag it out but God he wants it, wants more of all of this -- the way Bucky is moving inside of him and wringing an orgasm out of him that has his thighs shaking and toes curling and flexing against the sheets. 

This is what he’s been missing out on - the closeness, the kind of messy middle parts that everyone else has with their partners and families and best friends. He hasn’t let anyone get close enough for that until now - to see the soft underside that he has and that he’s often too ashamed to let show. But now he’s half sobbing into the mattress as Bucky uses his body to work himself to completion and Steve can’t get enough. He feels Bucky stiffen and then shove deep inside him and he moans as if it’s him coming again. Fuck he’s a mess. 

Over breakfast Steve thinks about what he has to say, and what he wants to know. That maybe he needs the same answer as Bucky does and that he can either drag this out and make it a production or he can show his cards or at least tip half his hand. It’s not like he’s going to lose.. well.. actually he’s not exactly sure about that but he’s pretty sure and that’s close enough. It has to be. 

As Bucky nudges some errant avocado back onto his toast, Steve spoons some sugar into his coffee and casually asks, “would you say you like-like me?” 

Bucky freezes with his toast halfway to his mouth and stares at Steve, almost incredulous at this turn of events. 

“Are you…” 

“I just… I was … well I want to know how to introduce you at things from now on and I can’t call you ‘my Bucky’ and you’re uh… definitely more than my friend so… would you say you’re my boyfriend, maybe?” 

Steve fidgets with his coffee mug and stirs the cream in trying to be nonchalant but he can tell he’s blushing to the tips of his ears and he finally looks up to see Bucky giving him a look caught somewhere between outrage and hilarity. 

“Rogers, I just nailed you so hard you cried and you aren’t sure if I like you?” 

“I had something in my eye!” Steve counters. 

“Yeah, uh, my dick,” Bucky snorts, reaching out and taking the coffee mug out of Steve’s hand and setting it down on the counter so he can crowd into Steve’s space, “yeah I fuckin’ like you, punk.” 

“Stupid jerk,” Steve whispers, wrapping his hands around Bucky’s waist and pulling them flush so he can kiss him. When he pulls back a second later, he leaves their foreheads touching and lets his thumbs brush over Bucky’s hipbones and up under the hem of his shirt, “you didn’t answer me though…” 

Bucky laughs softly and then noses against Steve, barely brushing their lips together as he talks, “yeah.. yeah I’m your boyfriend.” 

It’s hard to send him to the Neutral Buoyancy Lab that afternoon. Ostensibly Steve knew this was coming up and that it was a thing that was going to happen and he can’t be upset or surprised but it still comes like a punch to the gut when he’s dropping Bucky off to fly out there. 

He’s proud of himself because he kisses him goodbye and keeps his shit together until Bucky is taking off and then as soon as he’s driving back to the apartments he’s got pent up nervous energy that he can’t seem to find an outlet for. Steve changes the station on the radio, idly flipping between the 12 different options over and over and over and never really hearing what’s playing just knowing that the sound grates on his nerves and isn’t settling his mind. 

He tries his iPhone, hell he tries a podcast, but nothing gets his blood pressure down to normal and he can’t figure out why. This is just the NBL - it’s not a mission, it’s not critical, it’s just practice like all the other times before and Bucky will be back in a week. In that time Steve will water Melvin and finally get over and replace the coffee table like he’s been meaning to as a surprise and when Bucky comes back they’ll have champagne and Thai food. 

The concept jangles through his rattled nerves like a half assed electric current looking for something to power and Steve ends up going home, changing into his running clothes and then driving out to the beach. If he’s going to have nervous energy then goddamnit he’s going to use it for something productive, not just sit around waiting for Bucky to say he’s landed and then pace like a lion until he gets back. He can do this - this is what he’s been doing since he met Bucky and honestly it’s what he needs to get used to if they’re going to be doing this long term. 

If he can’t handle Bucky leaving for a week for training then he sure as hell isn’t going to handle him going to space. 

****

As if the universe heard him, three days after Bucky lands and is undergoing training at the NBL, the orders come down that launch is in six weeks. 

****

Steve isn’t proud, but he has a panic attack. He hasn’t had one in a long time, probably not a full blown one since around the time his mother passed away but he’s standing in Bucky’s apartment and watering Melvin and his hand starts shaking and he can’t seem to catch his breath. 

The idea that Bucky is going away. So _far away_ that if something happens he can’t help him, he can’t get to him, it’s a feeling of absolutely helplessness and he can’t let Bucky see him like this, can’t let anyone see him like this actually. He wants to have some kind of support, some kind of help but fuck, how does he tell someone what he’s afraid of? It’s what they’re all afraid of - this is it. This is just life on the Cape. 

When he gets his shit together he goes into the office and spends an hour meticulously rearranging his files which is his way of regaining control over his life even though it’s completely unnecessary and doesn’t actually achieve anything. Still, it makes him feel like he’s got something in order. 

Clint stops by and pokes his head in, pushing one of his Saturn V models two inches to the left and Steve squints at him. 

“Did you want to get lunch?” 

Steve sighs. 

“We can go somewhere with beer.” 

“That doesn’t seem strictly appropriate,” Steve points out. 

“Yeah well, fuck appropriate,” Clint shrugs. 

Steve looks up at him and Clint signs ‘launch’ and Steve looks down at his paperwork and then stands up and silently gets his coat. 

“Fuck appropriate,” Steve mutters. 

*****

When Bucky gets back he flies into Fort Lauderdale and goes to see his grandmother because of course he does and Steve kind of tries hard not to begrudge that but also he’s vibrating out of his skin and all he wants is to hold Bucky again and maybe not let him out of his sight until launch but he’s an adult and he needs to calm down. 

Easier said than done, party of one? 

So in the category of not having any chill whatsoever, when Bucky says he’s going to rent a car to drive back Steve says he’ll come pick him up instead even though that’s a not insignificant drive, but in his mind that’s more time he can spend with him and frankly he can’t take it anymore. 

“Why don’t we grab dinner somewhere fancy?” Bucky says. 

“Yeah, sure--” 

“I was thinking The Breakers, I’ve only been like once, but it was with my Nana and her Bridge Club so--” 

“Okay well just text me what time and I’ll be there.” 

Casual, completely casual, Rogers. 

Steve can hear him smile through the phone and he feels his whole chest swell up with it. 

“Yeah, I’ll get us a reservation then.” 

*****

Steve rocks back on his heels and looks at his watch before catching sight of Bucky, shrugging into a jacket as he half-jogs up the walk, nearly taking out an elderly couple in the process. Of course they forgave him and patted him on the head when he sweet talked his way around it, but that was to be expected. It was Bucky. He got away with that kind of thing.

The Breakers hotel grows out of West Palm Beach's wealthier district near the end of Worth Avenue and signals what was essentially the start of Billionaire Boulevard. The locals call it Millionaire Ave but to live there your net wealth ought to exceed the nine figure mark. 

Not that they could keep other locals and Floridians out, though there’s a prevalent rumor that might have truth in it that if you drove onto the strip without a Palm Beach plate you were followed from the time you entered on one bridge to the time you exited on the other. Something about tailing potential criminals. 

“I understand the need to be 'fashionably late' but you do realize they don't hold tables if you're fifteen over and you're pushing the eleven mark.” 

“That means we have four minutes!” Bucky slows to a stroll next to Steve and shoves his hands down in his pockets and smiles against the exotic colors playing over the Atlantic Ocean as the sun lights him from behind like some kind of demented Saint. 

 

Steve exhales and wants to paint him in that moment with colors that would make Lilly Pulitzer proud. 

“Come on, sweetheart,” Steve shakes his head and nods in the direction of the door and Bucky scatters in front of him like a nervous colt. 

They’re seated near windows and Bucky looks even better than Steve remembers and he wants to reach across the table and touch his face to make sure he’s still real, that this isn’t some fantasy that his hind brain is conjuring up just to fuck with his emotions. He doesn’t even realize he’s been staring until Bucky clears his throat and waves a hand in front of his face. 

“You okay in there?” 

“Yeah just… yeah.” 

“It’s just a lunar rendezvous you know? Not a full Mars mission,” Bucky says after a few minutes of awkward silence. “Just want to test compatibility and that shit… more of a crew and module training than anything else.” 

Steve nods along and then pauses for the waiter who appears to take their drink and food orders. 

“It’s .. yeah I mean it’s going to be fine,” Steve says out loud more to reassure himself than anything else. Bucky gives him a crooked smile and Steve turns and looks out the window because he’s afraid of what he’s going to do or say if he looks right at him. 

“You gonna be alright there, Cap?” 

“Sure...yeah, of course.” 

Bucky starts to say something but then doesn’t say anything at all and Steve feels that … because God there’s a whole lot he really wants to say but it just doesn’t feel like the right time. _Hey, heard that we’re going to put you on top of what’s basically a repurposed missile and fire you into the void -- you have a pretty decent chance of dying but great news I think I’m in love with you?_ Or how about… _in the event that you incinerate on re-entry, I want you to know I have feelings for you and that I’m going to be so fucking broken-hearted if you have so much as one hair out of place upon your return that I honestly wish that you wouldn’t even go up there to begin with._

Steve fidgets with the napkin in his lap and thankfully the food comes to make things marginally less awkward since they can talk about how good things taste and swap bites off their plates and pretend like this is all there is. This, this is a conflict that he can handle, that Bucky took the last bite of Steve’s steak and now Steve is reaching over the table and they’re causing a minor scene in one of the nicest hotels on the east coast of Florida just so that he can retaliate and cram the last of Bucky’s dessert in his mouth. 

And afterwards, when they’re in the parking lot, Steve doesn’t think twice about pushing Bucky up against the side of his truck and biting along his jaw, whispering ‘I’ll make it up to you’ as Bucky straddles his thigh and whimpers. 

It turns out the NBL isn’t exactly equipped to deal with sexual frustration. 

*****

It takes a lot to let him go after that, to put him on that rocket and launch him. Steve tries to be in the moment because he knows that he won’t get to redo this later, that this is Bucky’s first time going to space and that he’s excited about it and Steve isn’t going to do anything other than support that and make sure he’s enjoying himself. This is Bucky’s dream and Steve respects the dignity of his choice. 

Still, it’s hard because every time Bucky isn’t looking, Steve stares into the middle distance and tries not to grasp at things like ‘what if I never smell his hair fresh out of the shower again’ or ‘what if I forget what he tastes like in the morning?’ It haunts him inside of every second that everything _could_ go perfectly fine and in a few weeks this will all be over and Bucky will be sprawled out by the pool looking lethargic and whining about how he needs another coating of sunscreen on his back. Or Steve could have to do a lot of unpleasant things that he can’t even form into coherent thoughts. 

But that’s spaceflight isn’t it? The idea that at any moment there’s a stark all or nothing. Still, like Gus Grissom said, “If we die we want people to accept it. We are in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us, it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life.” He died in the Apollo 1 fire but that didn’t stop anything - the program, the agency persevered and Steve has to come to terms with the fact that he has to do the same. He’s no longer a bystander, he’s actively in this. 

Bucky props himself up in bed a few days before he leaves, hair messy and a pillow crease etched into his face and asks, “will you drive me to quarantine?” 

And Steve, God fucking help him, smiles like the sun, brushes a loose strand out of Bucky’s face and says, “of course, baby.” 

He almost throws up in the shower afterwards, palm flat on the wall as he takes deep breaths and tries to steady himself just thinking about it, but he’s not going to let Bucky see. 

*****

The night before his seven day quarantine, Bucky sleeps in Steve’s bed, they try to pretend that everything is normal and that this is just any other night but the list of things that have to be done, and concessions that have to be made isn’t insignificant. It’s hard to relax and Steve wants to make sure that Bucky is happy and excited while also making sure he knows that he’s going to be missed. It’s a fine line to walk and he isn’t sure he’s doing such a good job at it. 

But after dinner they let the dishes sit in the sink and they watch Disney movies because they’re lighthearted. Bucky sings along, badly, to most of the songs from Mulan and Steve proves that he knows all the words to the songs from The Aristocats. It’s fun and funny and when they flip on Inside Out neither of them are paying attention. Bucky kisses at Steve’s jaw and says ‘maybe it’s time for bed?’ and Steve nods, wrapping an arm around Bucky’s waist and dragging him up and towards the bedroom. 

Steve takes his time about it, doesn’t rush, just kisses Bucky everywhere and tries to put that whole part about missing him into every touch. It’s going to be awhile and he wants to memorize the way Bucky sounds, how he feels and smells. He wants to know every single bit of it before he sends him off so that when he’s feeling lonely he can call back on this and replay it in his mind. 

And Bucky, maybe he gets it a little, or maybe he feels some type of way himself, but he doesn’t make it into a joke - he touches Steve with gentle, lingering hands and doesn’t let him get too far away. They breathe in the same air, their mouths brushing with every gasp and moan. It’s sweet and tender and not what Steve thought it was going to be. 

“Don’t want it,” Bucky gasps when Steve reaches for a condom, “want to feel you in me.” 

It almost makes Steve come all over the sheets which defeats the whole purpose, but he hangs on and gives Bucky what he wants, slides into him bare and holds him down in bed, stroking over his side and fucking him and watching every micro-expression flash across his gorgeous face. 

“That’s it,” Steve whispers, kissing Bucky and watching him pant and shudder, “want you to come on my cock like this.” 

“Jesus Christ--” the air is punched out of Bucky’s chest and Steve chuckles a little at the flush that spreads down Bucky’s chest. How his fingers flex into Steve’s short hair and around his neck and shoulders. “Close-- I’m close--” 

Steve groans and speeds up just a little, reaching down and wrapping a hand around Bucky’s erection to bring him off in a hurry and Bucky keens as his orgasm hits him - arching off the bed and into Steve’s arms, his ass spasming and dragging Steve in even deeper and Steve wishes he could mark him up but he can’t and instead he’s just panting and moaning against Bucky’s chest. 

“Can I--” Steve begs, “can I?” 

“Yeah - yeah - don’t stop-” 

So he doesn’t, Steve fucks into him slower, more deliberately, but with just as much finesse as before, making sure that each thrust brushes over Bucky’s prostate and prolongs that warm bathwater feeling of a lengthy orgasm. 

“Come in me,” Bucky growls, “Stevie, do it--” Bucky pulls at Steve’s hair and that’s what does it - what sends him over the edge and has him burying himself inside Bucky’s body and coming until he sees stars. 

It takes a long time to come down afterwards, to unwind and motivate themselves to get cleaned up but they manage. It’s just another work trip, that’s all; everything is going to be fine. 

Steve curls around Bucky and spoons him, thinking that maybe he’ll be able to fall asleep but he sits up most of the night and thinks about how he won’t be able to do this for weeks, how this is the last time he’s going to have this until Bucky comes home. 

And of course the ever insidious thought of _if_ Bucky comes home. 

So he holds him a little tighter. 

 

******

The drive to quarantine is gut wrenching for Steve but they play Bucky’s favorite songs and Bucky reminds him that he’s only right here at the Cape -- they can still talk on the phone and everything is the same. Just like being in Johnson Space Center or something. Steve nods and smiles, says ‘I know’ and they don’t talk about the elephant in the room. 

When Bucky hops out with his duffel bag Steve stands there by his truck and knows by some strange certainty that he’s going to remember this moment for the rest of his life. The afternoon wind is hot and Bucky is smiling brilliantly in the sun. Steve should tell him he loves him but he wants to save it for when they have time to really talk about what that means and not when it’s just a last minute thought. 

“I’ll miss you,” Bucky says, stepping closer and wrapping an arm around Steve’s neck, holding him close and Steve just gathers him in as though he has the ability to tether him to earth with nothing more than this. 

“Not as much as I’m gonna miss you,” he mutters into Bucky’s hair. He smells like Steve’s shampoo and Steve is trying so hard to hold it all together. He can do this, just a few more minutes, a couple more fake smiles. 

They kiss, something solid and deep, meaningful but not heated and Steve traces the line of Bucky’s jaw to his throat and Bucky swallows once, staring at him. 

They’re quiet for a minute and then Bucky motions to the intake area. “Don’t … don’t drive off until I get inside okay?” 

Steve squeezes his hand, “I promise.” 

He watches Bucky walk away into the processing center and Bucky looks back at the door, gives a little wave and Steve waves back and smiles. They hold each other in a look for a moment too long and then Bucky is stepping inside and Steve waits until the door shuts before he looks down and sets his watch. 

The mission officially starts now. 

It’s a shit coping mechanism, Steve thinks to himself, driving home alone and ignoring the way his hands shake on the steering wheel. To try and breathe through it and pretend everything is okay so that everyone else can go to pieces around him. But he takes it seriously - that’s why he’s the Captain, he supposes. He’s picked all these people up drunk, taken them to the ER sober, gotten Clint out of some truly bizarre situations that don’t ever bear repeating, and he’s going to hold his shit together for Bucky too. Maybe for Bucky most of all. Perhaps it’s that there’s the expectation that keeps him going, that he knows they need him to be this person for them so he does it. 

He can let it all out when he gets home… sit on Bucky’s couch and read his too-smart magazines and wallow in the feeling of being surrounded by someone he misses so much the ache is a physical presence. He just said goodbye and yet when he slides onto Bucky’s worn in couch, he presses his face into the knit blanket and inhales deeply, letting the air shake through his lungs. It’s a little like having asthma all over again. That sense of drowning, of being held down under the waves, of all of it at once. But this is something he’s choosing to do and it’s not so much something he does _to_ himself as it is something he does _for_ himself. 

That night he crawls into Bucky’s neatly made bed and buries himself in the sheets. He went with him to pick them out at Target and even though it’s an idiotic choice for Florida they picked out flannel. It’s like wrapping yourself up in a well-loved shirt, and the material is heavy and under the dark comforter it’s a weight that Steve feels like he needs. He drags Bucky’s pillows in close and can still smell the faint scent of cologne and conditioner in the fabric and there in the dark he lets himself be as sad and as broken as he needs to be. 

*****

There’s something almost disruptive in how mundane it all goes from there. They talk to each other on the phone and the launch window starts to open. Hell, they even get a green on weather which is some kind of fucking miracle and honestly Steve feels like it’s all some kind of sign that things are going to be alright. 

The day of the launch is beautiful and Steve stands up at the press site with Natasha and Clint and Tony who flew out just for the occasion and it’s … fuck it’s okay. He feels kind of okay. There’s a sense of calm that comes over him and everyone takes him out for dinner and drinks and tells him that he’s officially an Astronaut Wife now and Steve blushes hard into his beer and actually lets someone else do the driving for once. 

They all end up crashing over at his place that night like a grown up slumber party and the next day Steve wrings his hands for about twenty minutes and then gets his fucking shit together like an adult and makes everyone cinnamon buns for breakfast and then waits for news like everyone else. 

He can do this. 

And it’s not like they aren’t ever in communication. There’s softphone downlink on the new ships like the ISS has which means the astronauts can call home more or less and barring that they can patch radio through the Mission Control Center, MCC, like the dark ages, but none of it is deeply private. Still, that first moment when Steve gets a call, it’s like everything he’s been waiting for in his whole life. The quality isn’t the best but even the crackle is sweet as Bucky laughs and says “hey Captain” like it’s no big thing. 

He’s calling from space and Steve is sitting on his patio like the day he moved in, looking out into the grass and at the pond and taking for granted the fact that he’s here on earth. 

“How do you like zero G?” 

Bucky snorts, “about as much as I liked it in the vomit comet, thank you.” 

Steve laughs and rubs at his chest, “you’ll get used to it or something. I’m sure I’m supposed to give you some kind of pep talk about the whole thing, what do you want to talk about instead?” 

“About how I miss my bed,” Bucky sighs wistfully, “having to velcro myself to the wall just doesn’t cut it somehow.” 

“Well, your bed and I are both waiting here for you when you get back. Sans velcro. Only what… 8 more days?” 

“Good,” Bucky says, but it’s wistful and Steve wishes he could say more. 

It’s not private and so much of what they talk about those first few days is light and impersonal and too short because other people need to use the phone and there’s work to do, this isn’t a social mission. It’s not bad but there’s a learning curve and Steve isn’t sure how to deal with it. 

At one point he slips up when Bucky says he’s having trouble getting to sleep and just says, “I wish I could hold you.” 

It’s like they both hold their breath on the line but nothing happens until Bucky sighs and Steve can hear how tired he is, “me too.” 

But things, they say, are looking good. The mission is going well and everything is on track for a successful lunar insertion. And then all at once, everything goes to shit.


	5. Curiosity - 2011

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are several emergency exits on this aircraft. Please take a moment to locate your closest exit. In some cases the closest exit may be behind you. 
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> If we need to evacuate the aircraft, floor-level lighting will illuminate to help guide you to the exit.

Steve hears about it at work the next day. He’d been running a little early and hadn’t checked his phone and when he gets in they’re all pulled into a mission critical conference for a briefing before anything gets leaked to the press. Steve can feel his palms sweating and he sits down next to Clint and gives him a sidelong glance. Clint signs ‘accident’ down near his lap and Steve’s pulse jumps and makes him feel dizzy. 

A few very important people make their way up to the stage. One of them is Sharon and the other are people that Steve hasn’t met before. 

The words blur together at first but what Steve picks out in snatches is that there was an accident with the deployment of the lunar module and there’s damage to the ship. It’s unknown if they can make it back home and there’s not currently a backup that can launch in time to rescue them before supplies run out. A rendezvous with the ISS is out of the question because of their trajectories and variant speeds. 

Mission Control is working the issue, and of course, “if you’re asked about any of this, remember, our standard line is ‘no comment’ and we let our PR team do their jobs. Don’t break rank on this please - this is a manned mission. People up there have family down here and it’s imperative we let them get the right info from the source, not dramatized soundbites.” 

As the woman says those words she makes eye contact with Steve and he wonders if he’s in trouble -- like maybe he’s said something without realizing it. Natasha is staring at him from across the room too and as the meeting is dismissed both women make a beeline for him. 

The PR woman makes it first. 

Natasha gives him a significant looks and Steve nods to her before reaching out and shaking the woman’s hand. 

“Christine Everhart,” she says, Sharon pops up next to them and smiles in that benign way she has and motions them off to a side room. “I need to have a few words with the Director but you and I need to chat, Mr. Rogers. I’ll be right in.” 

Sharon leads Steve to one of the smaller conference rooms and the two of them sit on opposite sides of the table in silence. Sharon shuffles through some files and finds what she’s looking for, slipping it into the middle with a pen and then looking up at Steve, folding her hands in her lap. 

“Christine is going to go over the details with you but don’t worry. Everything is fine, you’re not in trouble, and this is just standard protocol for friends, relatives, and … partners.” She hesitates on the word as if unsure how to define what he is and Steve relates because honestly he only just now learned what they were and now he’s not sure if he’s supposed to say that to just anyone. Especially people that wander around in tailored business suits and sharp high heels. 

When Christine walks in the room, Sharon stands and takes her work with her, waving goodbye to Steve as Christine takes the seat next to him. She smiles at him but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes and Steve can tell he’s being sized up but for what, he can’t tell. 

“We need to review how you want to sell this to the media before anything gets out of hand.” 

Steve blinks. “Sell?” 

“Your relationship with James Barnes.” 

Steve stares at her and feels the heat flood into his face and the ice run through the rest of his body. He doesn’t want to sell anything, least of all his relationship with Bucky. “I don’t want to tell anyone anything.” 

Christine nods, “we can work with that. There’s a possibility that someone will scoop you but we can run damage control if the time comes. If that’s how you’d like to proceed I’m going to need you to agree to a ‘no comment’ on all fronts policy. Do you think you can do that?” 

Steve nods, “I can. I don’t want anyone talking about him while he’s not here. Like he’s not …” he trails off and shakes his head and Christine hums. 

“Alright then,” she slides a business card to him and stands up, smoothing her skirt down and holding her hand out. Steve takes it out of ingrained politeness. “Call if you need anything. If something breaks, I’ll be in touch with you first.” 

She leaves in a flurry and Steve stays there before pulling out his wallet, tucking her card away and then dialing Natasha. She picks up on the third ring. 

“Hello?” 

“Is there a ‘no comment’ Facebook relationship status option?” Steve asks. 

Natasha sighs into the phone, “‘it’s complicated’ is close.” 

 

******

 

They pull him out of his apartment in the middle of the night to run CapCom in Houston. Say they have a plane waiting on the Cape, all he has to do was show up with a bag and they can go. Special invitation from Fury. Something about “circumstances.” Whatever that translated to was lost on Steve but he packs his bag and goes. Not because he gives a damn about Fury or publicity or NASA’s whole Agency Image, but because Bucky was on that tin can and he was going to be there come hell or high water. 

He flashes his badge at the ID station and rolls through after the requisite check. He’s been to JSC before but it feels a lot different in the middle of the night and during a crisis. 

 

An intern greets him at the desk and walks him back to the control room where Fury is waiting to brief him about the situation. What Steve hears from himis a lot like what he was hearing back at Canaveral, but now it all seems a lot closer… more dire. MCC is in contact with the astronauts and between the three of them, they’re not exactly working at optimal. Ground simulations were one thing, but in the vacuum of space when things are actually going wrong… it’s a bit like mutiny. 

When Steve walks in, they have the astronauts on the main screen and the Flight Surgeon is discussing blood pressure with Bucky who looks like he’s about to snap. Okoye is over his shoulder with a deadpan expression that could level South Beach so she’s probably on the same page. 

“Pass me the comms,” Fury says. 

“We’re trading you back to command,” the surgeon says, sighing, “listen, it’s the best thing you can do right now to help maintain stasis in the crew compartment. I know it’s not much but it’s what I’ve got.” 

“Understood,” Bucky dismisses them and rolls his eyes as Fury plugs in his headset. 

“We have a guest on hand, Barnes - think you can behave?” 

“Is it a politician? Because if so, then no.” 

Fury laughs at that, “no, someone else.” Fury motions to the headset on the counter and Steve picks it up and adjusts the mic.

“Barnes.”

Bucky’s face softens as he breathes out slowly, shakily, “hey Rogers.” 

Fury nods and backs up, dropping his headset on the table and motioning for Steve to take the seat and Steve does. They have video of the inside of the command module but the module can’t see them and for once Steve is grateful. He’s got tears in his eyes and he’s trying his best to control that but he can’t. 

“They said you were being a real jerk.” 

Bucky closes his eyes and huffs out a laugh, pressing his face into the side of the command module, “whatever.” 

“Listen… it’s -- I’m here uhm… in Houston. I’m gonna hang around until you land.” 

“If we land,” Bucky whispers. 

Steve coughs and Bucky tenses up because he knows he shouldn’t have said that. Just because they know it doesn’t mean they have to voice it. 

“They’re running some numbers back and forth right now, think you can nap a little bit?” 

“Yeah.” 

 

******

 

The calm doesn’t last. When the first round of schematics comes back, they aren’t good, and the astronauts let ground know about it. One astronaut in particular isn’t taking the situation laying down. So far there have been 37 suggested plans to save them. In all 37 plans, complete cabin failure and loss of crew were the final simulation output. It’s highlighted in red down both pages. And Steve? He gets it, he really does because he feels on the inside what Bucky is feeling on the outside - but he has to hide it, he has to put on this brave face and he has to make like everything is okay and be confident because that’s … that’s what Bucky needs, that’s what the whole crew needs from him right now and he won’t let them down. 

But God it hurts and he just … he wants to make it better when Bucky pinches the bridge of his nose and makes a frustrated growling sort of sound. 

“Buck-- you can't just haul off and start whacking it with a hammer.” 

“Then give me another option!” Bucky yells back, “where're the fucking engineers?! It’s been three days of this and we’re running out of life support!”

“They're working on it!” Steve huffs and balls his hand into a fist and lets it land against a non-critical part of the console and pleads through the comm, “they're _working_ on it and you just have to be patient!” 

“Rogers...” Fury had a warning tone but Steve can’t hear it. All he can hear is the blip of Bucky’s heart rate climbing, the sensor strapped to his chest still communicating back to earth exactly what Steve already knows – he’s scared. He’s scared and lost and that only makes him one more thing: really angry.

“PATIENT!?” It’s the wrong word to use and Steve knows it as soon as he sees Bucky hunch forward. He can tell he’s doing something with his hands, pulling at something, maybe just making a fist but whatever it is it isn’t going to end pretty, “be PATIENT. This coming from the jackass safe on the ground in his cushy chair.” 

“Buck-”

“Rogers I swear to God Almighty if you do not-” Fury tried to override the communications panel but he isn’t fast enough.

“You're not up here!” Bucky shouts, “You don't know what it's like! We're counting down how many more hours we have left and you're all just dicking around Mission Control like this is vacation! So where's Goddard? JPL? Wallops? Langley? Where's ANYONE at this point?!” 

“I said they're working on it! And you're going to have to wait, they have to diagnose and troubleshoot-”

“Yeah? I got a diagnosis for you – it's called fucking ineptitude.” 

Steve sees it coming – he figures out just what it is Bucky’s hands have been working on out of sight for the past three minutes, “Bucky don't d-”

“Troubleshoot this!” 

The comm hisses and the video feed goes to static. 

“Mother fu-” Steve cuts himself off and tears off his headset, flinging it into the console and scrubbing his hands over his face.

Mission Control lays stunned in front of him. People sit at their consoles, faces lit in eerie shades of pale white, green, and blue, all of them with similar expressions of shock and confusion. 

“Rogers!” Fury storms down to where he’s sitting and points accusingly at the main screen, “you mind telling me what _that_ was!?” 

“That was your commander giving you the middle finger because he doesn't think you're working fast enough.” 

“That was an outburst! I brought you over because I thought you might be able to work some sense of comfort into your team but it's clear that I was wrong.” 

Steve tries his damnedest not to roll his eyes or disrespect someone who clearly outranks him but he’s hurting in a way he hasn’t felt since his mother died and it’s like that except it’s every single day. That sharp pain in his chest like they’re taking him apart piece by piece and he just wants to be strong and keep the facade up that he has it under control but he knows he’s going to crack any minute. 

“I’ll just--” Steve motions to the hallway outside of MC and hangs his head, “work the issue with the rest of the team sir.” 

“You do that,” Fury says, taking over. 

*****

Out in the hallway, there’s people people running between offices, scrambling from MC to labs to conference rooms that have been set up as temporary work stations, sleep caves, you name it. If there’s a need, they’re trying to address it however they can, but as Steve walks out, there’s a pause in activity, all eyes turning towards him. 

“Can someone get Tony on the phone? Anyone? NOW.” Several people jump and an iPhone appears next to him, the tech who owns the phone dialing the number wordlessly. 

“Thank you,” Steve mutters, already turning, phone to his ear and listening to it ring. 

He knows for a fact the engineer will still be up, the man never sleeps. He has a suspicion that's how everyone at JPL is. A bunch of late-night techno-junkies who sit around holding soldering competitions on incredibly complex circuitry as an answer to what most men would call a pissing contest. 

Steve is _mostly_ right. 

“Good morning! Or night? Afternoon….?” Tony drawls. 

“I've got a problem.” 

Steve can hear the man on the other end sober up. 

“Huh. Well, you have called the right place - we are full of solutions here. And I should know, as alcohol is a solution and I’m full of it.” 

Steve groans. 

“Tony… please. Bucky, Okoye, and Peter are making a rendezvous with the lunar launch base.” 

“Copy.” 

“There was a malfunction on one of the staging sequences while leaving lunar orbit. They won't make it to the ISS obviously and…” Steve trails off because saying this next part is really admitting out loud what it is he’s been trying to deny this entire time, “it's iffy as to whether or not they'll make it back to Earth without some help.” 

“Christ.” 

“He's not available.” 

They’re both quiet for a moment and Steve can hear Tony shuffle in the background. He hears him relaying the information to whoever else was there, asking if any of them wanted some overtime and a challenge. When he comes back, Steve can hear the resolve in his voice.

“Huh. How fast can Houston get us the specs?” 

“They're on the way right now, I'll pick you up on the main comm line in MC so we can relay to the ship as soon as we re-establish contact.” 

Tony laughs, “he cut the downlink didn't he? That little shit...”

“Don't even start, Fury is fuming.” 

“I don't doubt it. Look, get us the specs on the problem and we'll start workin' the issues. It’s what we do, we were getting bored out here with just that satellite with a broken gyroscope. This is way more our speed.” 

“You got it.” 

“Oh and, Rogers?” 

“Yeah?” 

“We can get them back. We _will_ get them back.” 

“Yeah…yeah. Thanks.” 

He hangs up and hands the phone back to its owner before replacing himself at Fury’s side. 

Steve isn’t an engineer so he doesn’t actually work the issues or know what the problem is. People above his pay grade do, but he’s on a need-to-know basis and what he needs to know right now is how to call a lot of people and say things like “we’ll send over the schematics momentarily.” 

What that means to him is shit has gone monumentally wrong and people are frantically trying to fix it and the astronauts are probably being given very grim updates by the flight surgeon and other people that are not Steve. 

Steve is just… he doesn’t know what he is. He doesn’t know what he adds to the equation exactly. Other than he has some relation to Bucky and so they’re trying to use him to temper out the Barnes emotional roller coaster. At one point he did mission ops like this at Canaveral for the satellites and unmanned launches but this is another ballpark, a whole other level of terrifying that he’s never had to deal with. Maybe if he were detached from it all in some way it’d make it easier to take it as a learning experience, but he knows Bucky, he _loves_ Bucky… and he never told him that. 

And now, Bucky is very likely going to die in space and their final conversation is going to get recorded and put in top secret, redacted NASA files and he’ll have to live with that for a very long time and he’s not sure he can. He knows all this because someone told him. One of the people who comes in when they lock the doors had taken Steve aside when he arrived at Houston and sat him down in a very blank conference room like the one some tired engineers are sleeping in right now. 

\---

Sam sits down next to him at the table and offers him a warm, if sad, smile. 

“We need to go over some paperwork Mr. Rogers--” 

“Steve, please… I definitely am not from the Neighborhood.” 

Sam gives him a genuine grin and nods, pulling out several folders and setting them out and then grabbing a heavy looking pen. “Steve, James indicated in his file before he entered quarantine that you were his primary contact in case of emergency. He also designated you as his ‘partner’ and stated that in case of an accident, dismemberment, loss of life, or if he entered a vegetative state that you were the medically designated medical proxy and gave you power of attorney.” 

He smiles and Steve stares numbly down at the papers in front of him. He can see Bucky’s handwriting, he’s taking it in what he’s saying but this… they never talked about this. They never went over any of this together. There’s something about it that stings and it’s probably because Steve doesn’t know if it’s because Bucky cares about him the same way or because Steve is just the most responsible person in Bucky’s life.

“He… he didn’t say--” 

Sam nods, folds his hands into his lap and speaks slowly, “it can be difficult to talk about the worst case scenario with your loved ones before leaving on a flight. He may have felt it would have been distressing to you to discuss it at length or he may have found it too personally traumatizing. Can I answer any questions you have about the language on the documents?” 

Steve looks up at him and meets his eyes, “was he scared?” 

“Steve, I’m afraid I can’t talk about my private meetings with other personnel,” he says, his voice gentle, “I can tell you what’s in this file, and we can go over any questions you have about it.” 

They’re silent together, sitting in the empty conference room, the clock on the wall making a low sound as Steve scans the papers in front of him and runs his fingers over the looping cursive of Bucky’s signature. He can imagine him signing in a hurry, agitated to have to think about something so dark and unlikely - his fingers twitching against the pen as he made a snap decision on who to leave in charge. 

Steve wishes he knew why Bucky picked him - is he even worthy of this kind of responsibility? This seems like something more suited to a family member - a parent, a sibling, hell anyone who knows more about life than Steve does. Right now, all Steve knows is that everything he’s been looking forward to for the past year is running out of time and oxygen and they’re telling him that his job is to keep Bucky calm in the face of death and all Steve wants to do is lash out. 

“I’m not sure I can … focus on this right now,” Steve says honestly. 

“That’s understandable, it’s … it’s just policy that we review contingency with spouses and close partners in the event of certain likely outcomes. We always hope for the best, but we want you to know that we are prepared for any eventuality and that we are here to support you, Steve.” 

He reaches back in his bag and takes out a business card and slides it to him, “I’ll hold on to the records, but when you’re ready or if you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out.” 

They both stand up and they shake hands. Steve likes him and knows he’s doing his best. He can see how tired he is when he looks at him too closely. He’s impeccable and professional but at the very edges he can see where he’s been talking to parents, to staff, who knows who else. Steve hopes someone is looking out for Sam too… he looks like he deserves that. 

“Thanks, Mr. Wilson,” he says, heading towards the door. He nods in his direction and shows himself out. He tucks the businesscard into his wallet and walks slowly to the restroom. Steve counts his steps, counts his breaths, counts the tiles in the floor. 

And when he gets to the unisex bathroom he locks himself in, sinks to the floor in the pitch black, and cries himself hoarse. 

\---

 

 

“Rogers?” Fury interrupts his maudlin thoughts and Steve blinks up at the screen as this time Okoye is on the comm. 

“Whatever JPL sends over we can implement, it’s just a matter of .. what we have left to work with.. we can only apply so many of these work-arounds with limited supplies. I think you lot are going to have to decide which of these has the highest chance of a success and let us know which one to implement.” She pauses, narrowing her eyes critically at the list. “It won’t be all of them.” 

Okoye snorts at herself as if she’s made a joke even as a dark look passes behind her eyes. Steve can see Bucky in the background looking far away and Peter isn’t much better, he’s reading through a new list of specs that have just been sent up and appears to be doing an inventory check to see what’s possible. 

“We’re running a few simulations with the fixes to see what might be the best bet,” Fury says, flipping through the notebook on the table in front of him and Steve, “we’ll get back to you with what the tests say.” 

“Alright sir, keep us informed.” 

Okoye salutes and switches the comm to a standby mode and Steve glances down at Fury’s notes. 

Steve swallows and crosses his arms over his chest, looks at the map on the wall of MCC and thinks about the tracking stations from Gemini. Of all of them relaying to one another as the ship passed them in orbit - maintaining contact like a baton being passed from one station to the next, frantically trying to stay in communication and not let the signal drop, to not let the astronauts fade to black. 

The atmosphere is stifling and Steve thinks maybe he needs to get out, take a break, but he doesn’t want to - guilty about the fact that he _can_ take a break while Bucky is stuck up there, trapped and never coming up. That every second they have together, even ones where Bucky is tempermental and angry, are still moments he’s never going to get back or have again. 

So instead, he pulls up his chair, plugs in his phone, and settles in at his computer console for the long haul. He’ll stay until they kick him out or until it comes to an end. 

*****

Steve was there the last time they launched a shuttle at night off the cape. He doesn’t like to admit it but he cried. He watched them rocket man at seven point five million pounds of torque through the sky and when the stars winked out and deferred to human creation he was there. He was standing there and his chest went to pieces. This feels a lot like that did. 

There are the sounds of the monitors, their white noise filling the space in mission control. Steve imagines that while his end of the world hums in disuse, here, MCC, is more alive than a Georgia storm. The newscasters have been relentless, hovering around every corner ready to shove a mic and a camera in your face at any minute. They all have questions, all demand answers. But the agency is a united front. No comment. Steve is happy to play along but it’s all starting to wear him down. He just wants to leave for a few hours, take a shower in his hotel and come back in to start it all over. 

But there they are, their best friends when the news is good, their worst enemies when the news is bad. 

What can you tell us about the accident? 

_No comment._

What is the condition of the craft?

 _No comment._

What are their chances of surviving re-entry into Earth's atmosphere?

_No comment._

What is your relationship to James Barnes?

He wavers, looking up into the eyes of the reporter and holds her gaze for just long enough to be uncomfortable. 

“No comment.” 

 

That one’s the hardest. He puts his sunglasses on and gets into his rental car, pulling out of the parking lot with a wave and heading back out towards the Marriott he’s holed up in. 

 

The secret is out inside the doors of the agency but they’ve been working hard not to make their relationship the center of this entire controversy. Or whatever it is their relationship is. They hadn’t exactly gotten around to talking about that before the launch. They’re boyfriends and that means something but… what? 

Steve can’t parse, can’t wrap his head around it. Then again he can’t wrap his head around much these days. He’s living in between the hotel and the recycled air there and the stale terrified electric particles that are circulating inside of MCC. He showers back at his room and lays with the window closed and all the lights off. He thinks about sleep but even though he’s exhausted, all that he manages to do is stare into the bleak half-light of the place. It’s never really quiet enough… he can hear the maids servicing rooms, can hear the ice machine cycling, the elevator churning, and voices drifting in from televisions up too loud or conversations being held just a bit too excitedly. 

He wants to be excited, but all he can feel right now is dejected and lost. 

At some point, he must pass out on top of the covers, his body taking over where his mind just won’t shut up. He wakes up with a start, the hotel landline ringing off the hook and he answers, his voice heavy and slurred into the receiver. 

“Hello?” 

“Tried to reach you on your cell but it must be off, they’re about to bring the crew down--” 

“Shit-” 

Steve sits up and flails a pillow off the bed in his haste to find his phone, locating it on the charger and half ripping it out of the wall, “on my way in -- fuck.. fucK.” 

*****

A set of schematics had been sent over and Steve is there but he doesn’t understand them all the way, just that there’s a work around and that they’re going to try and hopefully that will hold them into re-entry. If not… well...contingency goes into effect. 

When Steve had finally sat down with Sam, actually gone over all the paperwork, there were several different protocols and scenarios that were in place for what they called rescue, retrieval, and recovery. Recovery was the lightest sounding word but it was the heaviest of them all. That would be in the event that they died on re-entry and whatever was left (if anything) was picked up by NASA. 

“It’s not looking good,” Sam says, sitting down with Steve. They’re on the floor behind the conference table because Steve can’t sit in that chair and hold himself upright and Sam actually understands that. Steve hunches further into himself and nods as much as he can with his chin in his chest. 

“Alright.” 

Sam sighs and Steve doesn’t begrudge him this line of work. On the good days you tell people that there’s paid paternity leave to stay home with their new baby but then there’s these days and it’s like, how do all those good things make up for this? 

They’re silent and then Steve hears a lot of papers rustling and then a soft flap as he assumes the file hits the floor. 

“Man, I’m … I’m supposed to be professional but I just -- listen. They don’t know how this is going to shake out,” Sam says, voice hushed, “I’m supposed to counsel you and tell you to ‘prepare for the worst case scenario’ and not really frame out what that could be but Rogers you’re a smart man, what do you think that means?” 

“Loss of crew,” Steve says, shifting so he can lay his head back against the wall and look at Sam. 

“Yeah, loss of crew,” Sam repeats, looking down at his folded hands, “I … my husband Riley is in the Air Force and if someone told me that he wasn’t coming home and they were tiptoeing around that I’d lose it. So listen, I don’t know. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I’m not a rocket scientist. But what I do know is that I won’t send you in there without telling you that it looks real fuckin’ bad.” 

Steve nods, looks at the ceiling and feels the tears well up, hot in the corners of his eyes. 

“You might have a chance to talk to him before then but brass is going to tell you not to make it a ‘goodbye’ type of chat - they don’t want them depressed or thinking this is going to be the end, they want them thinking it’s all going to go right. But Steve? I can’t promise you it will.” 

And there, there it is. 

The tears roll down his face but Steve just closes his eyes and nods silently. 

“Tell him whatever you need to tell him without it sounding like I clued you in and don’t leave that call with any regrets.” Sam puts a hand on his shoulder and squeezes and Steve nods, just nods and tries to take a deep breath through it. “And when you get through that, you might want to think about what else needs to be said. In the worst case scenario.” 

The air catches in his throat and Steve coughs, doubles forward as Sam rubs between his shoulder blades, “Rogers it’s … I get it man… I get it.” 

And for the first time he feels like maybe someone does understand even a little of what he’s going through but it’s still such a personal and singular pain that he knows it’s also just his to hold onto and bear through. 

“I never told him I love him,” Steve gasps out. 

He feels Sam’s hand still on his back. 

“Maybe now is a good time to bring that up.” 

*****

Steve pulls a chair up next to Fury and Fury turns to him, arms crossed over his chest. 

“You gonna ride out here at MCC or are you going to take a hopper back to the Cape?” it’s not accusatory, but Steve sees the opening he’s being given and he doesn’t think twice about it. 

“I’ll take LC and the Cape, sir.” 

Fury nods, “you’ll have some black out time there that we won’t… but someone here will loop you in if needed.” 

There’s an unspoken ‘if things go wrong’ there and Steve just nods back. 

They shake hands and Fury pulls him into a hug, giving him a solid hit on the shoulder, “we’ll see all of you back at Kennedy, won’t we?” 

“Yeah,” Steve says, not meeting Fury’s eyes, “guess I’ll owe you all a lot of drinks.” 

Fury snorts and Steve heads out, escorted by a couple of staff towards where he can catch a flight back home. 

*****

Steve sits there with his face upturned towards the stars and thinks about how all of history and religion and literature tries to tell you that we suffer for the greater good in life. That to truly understand living, to embrace all that life is and means we have to endure pain; unspeakable pain, even. And he doesn’t quite understand that. Why can’t we just be happy and well and loved? Why can’t we triumph without the hurt? He’s fairly certain he would be just as happy to have Bucky back right now without all the heartache. 

He flies back to the Cape because there isn’t anything else he can accomplish in Mission Control that they can’t patch through to the LC and he wants to be there if they make it or if they don’t. Because he won’t be able to wait one second more to see Bucky if he’s alive and if he’s dead he doesn’t want to face the crush of reporters outside of MCC when he wants to wallow. Wants to be allowed to mourn and hide in private before he’s expected to face the publicity of it all.

Which is why he’s driving Bucky’s car inside the KSC property lines. It’s happening in a few hours - the landing attempt. It’s all anyone can talk about on television. The next Apollo 13, they say, and Steve can’t handle it because they all have a distance from the story, can keep it all separate in their minds and say oh how sad this all must be I feel sorry for them... glad that isn’t my son or wife or partner. But it’s real to Steve, achingly real and ambiguous. He turns into the service roads that need a higher level clearance and no one even pays him much attention, just sees his badge and waves him through. This should be Bucky taking the car joy riding, he should be driving it with the top down and listening to the silence and cacophony of the cape at night.

Steve aches, he aches and can’t breathe and tries not to let it get overwhelming but it is. The pressure of having to put on a face every day for his coworkers, of having to talk to Bucky on the softphone and say things like _it’s all going to be alright_ and _I’m waiting for you when you land._ Having to sanitize his own emotions and keep it secret because he’s mortified that he never told Bucky face to face and he can’t tell him now, now when he doesn’t know if it’s reciprocated and Bucky is 125,000 miles away and might not make it home. Don’t rock the boat had been the official line and Steve... damn his heart, had listened. 

But on the plane ride back he had sat and written it all down by hand on yellow, lined paper. Every single word of how he felt. A lingering, meandering manifesto that included cliches and truth, that had their favorite songs, and their first kiss. Steve committed it all to the page in a stream of consciousness. This was their entire relationship from the time they met in a bar to the way Bucky smiled first thing in the morning. It was how much Steve loved him and what he felt every time that Bucky gave him the time of day and how stupid he felt that he had never said more about it. That everything they had was tenuous and incomplete and might always be that way. Steve wrote about desperation, about wanting to know everything about Bucky and how he might never learn it, about how he couldn’t sleep right thinking about Bucky above the earth and maybe not making it home.

His nerves feel rattled and he can’t concentrate on the lines of the road so he pulls off at pad 34 which is quiet and dark and abandoned and he knows no one will bother him out here. He parks the car and hops out, leaving the keys in the ignition, not trusting himself not to drop them somewhere and instead he ambles across the pebble and sand strewn concrete lit up by the moonlight. 

Steve runs his hand over the **ABANDON IN PLACE** marker on the launch platform and can hear the waves in the distance, crashing on the shore and thinks about that first night on the beach with Bucky. About how he had pointed up at the red planet and said ‘I’m going there’ with such enthusiasm and joy and the contrast to how he looked now in the downlink from the shuttle. He was tired and defeated, desperate to get out and return and knowing that return was probably unlikely. Steve wanted more than anything for that same joy and excitement to come back to him, for this whole situation to not have ruined space for Bucky. He can’t stand the idea of all that wonder and happiness being tampered with. 

Steve sinks down to the ground, leaning back against one of the pillars and stares out into the distance. They’re out there now, all three of them, waiting to find out if they make it home and Steve is carrying around pages and pages of his feelings that he might never get a chance to say out loud to the man he loves. 

“I’m a fucking idiot,” he says to the Cape. 

The Cape answers in the the way it always sounds at night. The wind hissing through the sawgrass, the insects buzzing and humming in the scrub pines, the reptiles and amphibians calling to one another in the cover of darkness. The restless noise of a land that’s alive and waiting to take it back from the humans who inhabit it and Steve thinks he’d be happy to be grown over right there and become one of the first casualties. 

And because it’s likely that no one else will ever hear those words, Steve says aloud then, “I’m in love with you, James Buchanan Barnes.” 

The warm ocean wind caresses his face and Steve thinks about what he’s going to do in two hours when they find out if the astronauts made it. 

*****

Steve… doesn’t remember a lot of it. He’s sleep deprived, he hasn’t eaten enough and he’s so stressed out he’s probably going to give himself an aneurysm. But there he is at the Shuttle Landing Facility and waiting. It’s been 7 days of on-ground quarantine and 5 in space and he’s twisting himself up in knots. 

There was a hope that after re-entry they would regain communications and hear whether or not the crew had made it. But one of the work-arounds involved severing a comms line and re-routing that to the autonomous landing gear. It means no one will know if the crew is alive until the landing is complete… but it means the vehicle and everyone in it will make a safe landing. 

All of the monitoring systems are dark and MCC runs calls on the channels despite knowing they aren’t going to get a repeat. If the vehicle lands and they receive feedback from Launch and Landing that they’ve switched to Recovery protocol than Steve will hear “everyone save your work, keep recording at your stations, no one leave. Lock the doors.” Then the rest of the conversation for him at his station will go dark. 

Natasha and Clint are watching in the spectator area along with some of their other friends and Steve heard that Tony was en-route to the Cape from JPL with a couple of his techs. Whatever the outcome they want someone on the ground to investigate. 

Nothing prepares him though for the moment that range spots the craft and they have eyes on the vehicle - eyes on and tracking it as it moves through the glide and descent phase of the landing. There’s nothing for them to do as onboard computers have control of the landing and at this point it’s all up to the craft to make things go right. 

Steve feels like he’s dying, that this must be what it’s like to die. His entire body is on fire with wanting to know and yet, this is it - it’s Schrodinger’s theory all at once. Right now Bucky is both dead and alive and in a few minutes he’s going to be only one or the other and that’s permanent and there’s no going backward again. 

His hands clench on the console in front of him and the vehicle comes in at what feels like a snail’s pace but what is actually faster than the speed of sound and when it’s over… it’s over suddenly and without the dramatics and theatrics that one would expect of the situation. The vehicle touches down and the smoke peels off the tires and the vehicle self corrects for wind shear and then it’s done. It’s sitting on the tarmac and Steve makes a strangled noise in his throat. 

A crew rushes out to the vehicle and Steve is torn between watching it all unfold and closing his eyes until it’s over. 

Is prayer even worth it at that point? Does it mean anything at all? Or is it just another meaningless exercise in the pantheon of expended efforts. 

“Please,” Steve whispers, folding in half and pressing his face into his hands. 

An indistinguishable shout goes up from someone in the room and then many more people are shouting and banging on the glass. Steve doesn’t hear their words, doesn’t hear what it is they have to say, he just slides into a chair and with a trembling hand, he hits the button to stop his watch. 

Mission complete. 

*****

Tony arrives in his usual blaze of glory but with an unusually large entourage that gets swept away by Christine and Alexander and a lot of other high ranking people Steve doesn’t actually care about. Instead Steve’s sitting down, body turned to face Bucky, one arm propped against the back of the couch they’re on as he stares at the line of his nose and chin and jaw, trying not to take for granted every second he has in his presence. 

“Her brother is T’Challa,” Tony says, pulling a chair up next to them and shaking some chocolate covered blueberries into Bucky’s outstretched hand. 

“Who?” Bucky squints and Steve reaches out, trailing fingers through his hair absently. The texture is still a little off from the closed circuit air in the vehicle and then whatever he was given to shower with on ground in the facilities and Steve keeps thinking about taking him home. 

“Okay, you remember Elon Musk?” 

“God… unfortunately?” 

“Yeah buddy - same.” Tony scoffs and then looks like he’s trying to think of how to describe something like the input telemetry for the Voyager gravity assists to a preschooler, “Think that level of wealth. But multiply it by a million. Now he’s also a monarch of his own country and a fucking genius engineer. Oh and he’s not a monumental douchebag. He was on the cover of Forbes after the whole SpaceX meltdown.” 

“Oh shit,” Bucky breathes, “he’s the head of Vi-Space!” 

“The one and only -- well okay actually his cousin has some low-level claim to it and so does his sister but--”

“I get it Tony, he’s a third party private space … guy.” 

Tony makes an exasperated noise, “so much more than that. But his sister- she found the fix. Not only that but they ran the simulations faster than anything I could have because they’re working off of tech that … quite frankly makes what we have look ridiculous.” 

“There’s an argument in here about budget allocations and what happens when Republicans destroy the economy,” Steve says, a dark look on his face. 

“Marginal tax rates, I get it babes - anyways. They’re kicking our ass and you should send Shuri a fruit basket.” Tony says with a shrug. 

“Okoye was the only one who could have rewired the comms,” Bucky says, looking down at his hands and then over at Tony, “she saved us … I mean you all did, or Shuri and her team did but…” 

“I get it,” Tony says, voice quiet and solemn, “we ought to do more work with them instead of the Russians if you ask me… nothing against the cosmonauts but what Vi-Space is doing is so far advanced and so much better… we really ought to be giving them our launch contracts.” 

“Mm…” Bucky nods and then looks out into the middle distance and stares like he’s doing complex trig. 

“You okay, soldier?” 

Bucky turns to Steve with a half-assed smile, “yeah, something like that.” 

It’s been three days since they came back and they’re still running tests on everything from the vehicle to the crew to the mission support teams and all Steve can think about is that he just wants to drag Bucky away somewhere and turn off all their phones and computers and tablets and pretend the whole world doesn’t exist because in that whole time that Bucky was gone it felt like he’d lost everything important in his life. The things that had meaning were worthless and he … he just has to tell him part of it. The important part. The I love you part. 

But not here, not now and not like this. Not surrounded by the spectre of failure, not when it’s all still fresh and Bucky keeps complaining that he smells like recycled air and ozone. 

*****

It’s a week after they come back that Bucky and Steve leave and go find some place to rent on the water. It’s secluded and they can turn off their phones when they feel like it or invite people over or just lay in bed until noon. They’ve been there exactly 18 hours when Steve is building a fire in the firepit for Bucky and they’re having some beers and listening to the ocean. 

“Why don't we talk about the human factor?” 

“I don't want to,” Steve says, poking at the logs he just set on and trying to get them into just the right position to really light up. He takes another piece of paper out from under his arm and shoves it in as kindling, watching the pages curl up and turn black. 

“What are you burning?” 

Steve just stares at the flames. Watching as they lick up the pages, charring them beyond recognition. Every once in awhile he catches a word or two and remembers the rest of the sentence which just makes him stoke the fire a little harder. He had written that stupid diatribe to bury with whatever remains they recovered and instead the man himself is standing right there in tacky hibiscus board shorts and a _Ron Jon_ shirt sipping a beer. 

It’s ludicrous. He’s grateful of course, but his heart can’t take it. 

“Newspaper or something? You know you can recycle that right?” 

“It isn't newspaper.” 

“Then why are you burning it- ooh is this some kind of illegal paper trail? Stevie, are you in with the mob?” 

Steve makes a strangled sound and drops the poker to the ground, “I am NOT in with the mob!” he yells.

“Oh.” 

Bucky takes a step or two back and falls into a rickety rattan chair and Steve crosses his arms angrily over his chest staring up at the sky. The smoke from his pyre is leaving a wispy trail over the stars but they glow obsequiously on. They have no idea. 

“If it was the mob, you'd tell me right?” 

“Yes Buck, if it was the mob, I'd tell you.” 

Which was just sad. He'd be able to tell Bucky if he were in on some illegal hit but he can’t even tell him that he'd written a manifesto of his feelings in the event that Bucky died. 

Every page was an admission of his feelings not just to Bucky but to himself. He was a cerebral man, he didn't just say this kind of stuff – he had to think it, had to feel it and had to show it. There was a time there where he thought he wouldn't do any of those things so he wrote it all down. He wrote down every damn thing he remembered about them. He wrote about how they met, about the convertible, the Breakers Hotel, about Melvin, the cactus that never fucking bloomed. It was all there. It was their life and memories and feelings. It was so many fucking feelings. 

He poked more violently at the logs and tossed in a few more pages and looked up as the embers twisted in and mixed with the stars just enough to be confusing. 

 

“When you’re up there they aren’t just above you, they’re in every direction,” Bucky says out of nowhere. 

Steve glances over at him and Bucky just blinks up at the sky like it has answers. “I kept thinking about how I would miss that, seeing stars in every direction. But it paled in comparison to how much I missed you.” 

Bucky turns his eyes back towards Steve and Steve finally finds his voice. “Why was I your ‘break glass in case of emergency?’” 

Bucky smiles, but it’s sad, “because I couldn’t stand the thought of you not being the first to know. I didn’t want you to have to wait one second if anything went wrong. Because if … if it were the other way around, Stevie I’d go crazy.” 

Steve swallows and thinks it’s awfully bold of Bucky to assume that he _didn’t_ go crazy and that this is all very normal and adult behavior because as far as Steve is concerned he’s lost his whole mind. 

“I couldn’t… I couldn’t have done what you did,” Bucky admits. “I couldn’t be on the ground doing nothing, I don’t know how you…” he lets the words hang there in the air and shrugs, looking lost. For all that they’re almost the same age, Bucky looks so much younger in this moment that Steve wants to protect him from the whole wide world. 

“I don’t think I did very well,” Steve says, looking down at his hands. At the pages and pages of how very well he did _not_ do. “I thought I was going insane. I thought I was dying. I thought half the time I was in some kind of lucid nightmare that I just needed to try harder to wake up out of.” 

Bucky pushes himself out of the chair and comes around towards Steve and Steve tenses his hands on the pages out of reflex. 

“All I wanted,” Bucky says, voice gentle, “was to come home to you. Because you’re home. You. Wherever you are.” 

It’s raw and not very well rehearsed and Steve thinks about all the really creative romantic ways he thought about this playing out and this is exactly none of them. He makes a choked off sound and starts to crumple up the papers but Bucky is there, stopping him. 

“Don’t,” Bucky says, all soft, laying a hand on top of where Steve is clutching them until his knuckles turn white. “Don’t hide this.” 

“What?” 

Steve feels a strange pull like a lick of cold deep water when you’re in the warm ocean shallows. 

“Steve I still can’t sleep right and you left it out on the table so I thought… I thought it was a eulogy or something and I don’t know maybe it’s morbid but... but I wanted to see what funny things you were going to say about me.” Bucky shrugs and tries to laugh but it’s a helpless sound and he rolls his head to look out over the ocean. “And it turns out that you didn’t write a eulogy at all. You wrote a love story.” 

Steve freezes, his blood running cold as he looks down at the pages and pages of words, some of them burned up, some of them falling out of his shaking hands into the fire and going up in thick grey smoke. 

Steve shoves his hands into his pockets, the shame hitting him like a freight train and turns, trying to hide his face. “I’m sorry.” 

This isn’t how it was supposed to go. 

“For which part?” 

Steve starts to talk and Bucky presses in close, cutting him off with a shushing sound. 

“No, listen --” Bucky crosses his arms over his chest and stares Steve down. And Steve knows in that moment why Bucky is the astronaut and he isn’t. Because Bucky for all he says otherwise, is fearless. Bucky can stare down death and won’t walk away - instead he walks right into it. “Are you sorry you love me or sorry you didn’t tell me?” 

“Oh Buck--” Steve exhales and slumps, starting to relax down and then stiffen and then he starts again with both his arms open, wrapping them around Bucky and dragging him into his chest. He tangles the fingers of one hand in Bucky’s hair and the other he digs into the back of his sweatshirt, trying to get him as close as possible. “I’ll never be sorry I love you.” 

It isn’t how he would have done it, it’s maybe later than it ever should have been, but it’s probably how it was supposed to go all along. Steve is grateful and tired and he never wants to let Bucky out of his sight again. It’s a silly feeling and a dramatic response which he understands, but he thinks he’s allowed some dramatics after everything. Still, he knows that when the time comes he will undoubtedly put Bucky on another rocket, send him to space and watch him be brilliant and come home safe… over and over and over. There’s something in that, in this whole thing really. That Bucky in his own joy and passion and excitement has managed to give some of it back to Steve. Or maybe it isn’t the same as it was when he first started but it’s something new and that’s just as good. The starburst feeling in his stomach like champagne when he hasn’t had anything to eat. Steve feels a little dizzy on his feet just holding Bucky in his arms and having _this joy_. Right now is all he wants for just a little while longer. To savor all of this unreservedly. And what makes it all even better is that Steve knows he earned this, and for that? He’s not ever letting it go. 

Steve feels Bucky’s face burrowing into the juncture of his neck and shoulder and there, under the stars, and in the ashes at the end of the world, Bucky whispers “I love you too” and Steve is no longer afraid of anything.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because this is the kind of interminable detail that will bother me if I don't put it somewhere.. 
> 
> ...the vehicle they're in is never expressly named or described with much detail and that's because it doesn't strictly exist. Currently all crewed flight is being done out of capsules like the Soyuz and soon Dragon and Orion. I have nothing against capsule launches but also I have a long love affair with the Shuttle but since that retired in 2011 I didn't want to use it... for a number of reasons not least of which is because the Shuttle doesn't go to the moon and CANNOT GO TO THE MOON. (I see you waving over there going 'yes but what about Transformers??' and to that I say Michael Bay is an idiot. The furthest the shuttle can travel especially on a non-modified stack is the Hubble and NO FURTHER. That's it the end. Also did he not get payload bay schematics?? I'm offended. No further questions.) 
> 
> In my head the vehicle they're using is likely something crossed between Sierra Nevada Corp's [Dream Chaser](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dream_Chaser) and the DOD's [X-37B](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_X-37). Neither of these are crewed space craft though the SNC Dream Chaser could be in the future. The X-37B is largely a mystery since it's property of the Department of Defense and they don't let us play with all their toys. 
> 
> At any rate, going by the fact that the X37 can stay up for around 400 days, and that both it and the DC are reusable and able to land like the shuttle but are both smaller and launch on top of staged rockets they were ideal candidates to model the space ship on for the fic. The key is that a craft this small would be able to complete a short lunar reconnaissance mission with on-board life support for 3 crew in the time frame given. Especially if they weren't weighed down with an especially burdensome payload like a huge lander module or anything like the Shuttle used to carry or capture (e.g. the Hubble Space Telescope). 
> 
> The longest shuttle mission was around 17 days and the Apollo missions usually lasted around 8 days all told. My best guesstimate was to put their fictional mission at a 10 day mark but it of course gets cut short because of the accident. That would mean the smaller size shuttle craft would only have to carry on board supplies for 3 astronauts for 10 days... which feels doable. Likely it would have needed some on board thrust capacity which as far as I can tell neither the DC or X37 have but it could be done. Buran had them installed and that was in the 80s so ... fuck your hypothesis otherwise tbh. They wouldn't have a ton of fuel to burn but enough to do corrective maneuvering and like getting into/out of orbit.
> 
> I did keep in autonomous landing but that's because I think that's badass. Like yeah I know shuttle pilots can land the things but sorry, robotic landing is still baller. you can @ me. I think that's it if you have some pressing question let me know though I way overthought this.


End file.
